


Unexpected Avenues

by GenerallyHuxurious (GallifreyanOmnishambles), SinceYouAskedMeForATaleOf



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alpha Dopheld Mitaka, Alpha Kylo Ren, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha/Omega, Armitage Hux & Clan Techie are Brothers, Armitage Hux is Not Nice, Asexual Character, Asexual Relationship, Asexuality, Asexuality Spectrum, Awkward Conversations, Awkward First Times, Awkward Sexual Situations, Brendol Hux's A+ Parenting, But Not Of Anyone We Care About, Childbirth, Complicated Relationships, Discussion of Abortion, False Identity, Family Feels, Family Reunions, Force Ghost Shenanigans, Force Nonsense, Friends to Lovers, Ghosts, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Kylo Ren is Not Nice, Love Confessions, Lovers to Friends, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Mental Breakdown, Mind Control Aftermath & Recovery, Minor Clan Techie (Dredd)/Matt the Radar Technician, Murder, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Omega Armitage Hux, Omega Verse, On the Run, Panic Attacks, Partial Mind Control, Past Armitage Hux/Dopheld Mitaka, Past Armitage Hux/Kylo Ren, Post-Canon Fix-It, Relationship Negotiation, Rescue, Self Confidence Issues, Self-Defense, Self-Indulgent, Sex Positive, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Spoilers, That's Not How The Force Works, The Force, Twins, Unplanned Pregnancy, asexual alpha, the cat is fine, trust me - Freeform, y'all are gonna learn to trust me one day
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-05
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:21:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 15
Words: 84,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22136224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GallifreyanOmnishambles/pseuds/GenerallyHuxurious, https://archiveofourown.org/users/SinceYouAskedMeForATaleOf/pseuds/SinceYouAskedMeForATaleOf
Summary: No one wanted to take this particularly grisly task, but Dopheld is glad it fell to him when he realises that all is not as it seems.Can he make a new life on the run with his ex, now that everything he thought he knew has been turned upside down?[Instant spoilers for Rise of Skywalker]
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Armitage Hux/Dopheld Mitaka, Armitage Hux/Kylo Ren
Comments: 193
Kudos: 245





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I ate'nt dead 
> 
> Expect my usual shenanigans and plan accordingly

Despite living through the collapse of Starkiller Base and the destruction of half the First Order fleet, Dopheld Mitaka had never heard a sound as loud as General Hux’s body hitting the deck. 

He’d barely even registered the blaster shot—his focus had been on the screen in front of him, not the chatter of the command crew behind him—so it took all his focus not to cry out as his Omeg—as the General fell. As casually as Pryde had handed the blaster back to its owner, Dopheld wasn’t stupid enough to think that any show of loyalty to a dead officer wouldn’t be punished in exactly the same way. 

He bit his lip, forced his eyes back his terminal, and tried to will away the tears that were threatening to give him away. There was nothing he could do, and nothing he could have done. Diving in front of the blaster in the middle of a crowded bridge would have only led to both of them getting shot. Besides, whoever Allegiant General Pryde really was, he had the ear of Kylo Ren.

Who would ever have predicted that the First Order’s fortunes would go from bad to worse to  _ Supreme-Leader-Kylo-Ren _ ? Everyone knew he had been Snoke’s apprentice but no one had actually expected that unstable lunatic to take over—Hux had at least been able to keep his temper. Hux wouldn’t have immediately wandered off with a gang of odd-smelling warriors in a ship that badly needed an engine tuning. Hux wouldn’t have left the day-to-day operations of the fleet in the hands of an officer no one had ever seen before. Then again,  _ that _ was probably why he was lying dead on the deck right now.

Dopheld wondered if he was going into shock. He couldn’t quite seem to get his brain around that last idea. Hux was dead. His body was cooling only three metres away from him. His Hux. Dead on the deck in a rumpled heap.

Part of him wanted to turn and look, wanted to reach out and touch him, just to be sure. It was that same stupid little voice that occasionally made him sass his superiors, and had baited Kylo Ren into choking him with the Force over an ill-timed joke. 

The voice that had given him the courage to buy Hux a drink that time in the officers’ lounge, all those years ago.

He’d loved Hux once. 

In the long night cycles alone in his bunk Dopheld might occasionally admit to himself that he  _ still _ loved him, even after Hux had ended their arrangement in the name of ‘propriety’. Even after the rumours started that Hux smelled like an unknown Alpha. Even after the fall of Starkiller, the loss of half the fleet, the death of Supreme Leader Snoke, the rise of Kylo Ren—Hux had always been the last thing on Dopheld's mind when he fell asleep and the first when he woke.

Dopheld was sure that wouldn’t change any time soon, even if Hux was dead on the deck behind him.

He needed to concentrate. This line of thought wasn’t helping. 

Pryde had turned his back before the corpse had even slid to a complete stop. Almost instantly the rest of the crew followed his lead. More attention would have been paid to a spilled glass of water than to the remains of the former General.

He had no idea how long he’d been blankly staring at his screen. Someone would notice if he didn’t pull himself together soon.

“Dispose of that.” 

It took Dopheld longer than it should have to realise he was being addressed directly. The officer to his left was staring at him, his head twisted at an odd angle, as if he’d rather strain his neck than let the sight of the body into his peripheral vision.

“Sir?” Dopheld had registered words, but not their meaning. 

“Now, Lieutenant Mitaka.” The officer gestured sharply to the shape on the deck. “Dispose of it.” He repeated, clearly enunciating every syllable.

Bile rose in his throat when he realised what the officer meant, but he stepped forward anyway. He’d never been one to refuse an order, and he wouldn’t now. 

As he bent down Dopheld half expected Pryde to shoot him too, as if the Allegiant General would be able to sense the details of their former relationship from the way he approached the corpse. 

To his relief Pryde paid him no mind. 

To his disappointment neither did anyone else.

Hux might have been an Omega but he’d been unusually tall for his designation, and that made his body unwieldy for a single person to move. Dopheld wondered if he’d been selected for the task specifically because it would be difficult for him—during basic training the officers had delighted in giving the ‘Tiny Alpha’ all the toughest jobs.

He wondered if they were secretly laughing at him.

Probably not. No doubt they’d realised that it could be their own bodies on the floor next, and it just wouldn’t do for any of them to handle the corpse. 

Dopheld gripped the General’s wrists and rolled him onto his back. It wasn’t a dignified position, but the satin of his uniform might make him easier to drag this way. He felt sick to be treating his body so poorly, before it was even cold yet.

How long did a corpse take to cool? 

Through the synthleather of his gloves, the late General's slim wrists positively radiated heat. 

Heat. 

And a pulse.

Dopheld bit his bottom lip so hard that the taste of blood filled his mouth. 

He wasn’t stupid enough to reaction to that revelation, not here in the middle of the bridge. Announcing that Hux might still be alive would just earn them both a blaster bolt through the head. If he was alive Dopheld wanted to keep him that way.

Keeping his head down so his cap would cover his eyes, he dragged the body roughly towards the double doors. 

Someone to his right tutted quietly—probably Dex, the navigation officer who’d always had a soft spot for Hux—but they didn’t say anything. He didn’t risk looking up.

The path between the bridge and the first bank of turbolifts had never seemed so long.

He should have gone to the gym more often. He should have done weight training instead of sticking to cardio. He should have accepted the offer of artificial Alpha hormones that time the creepy kid from the hanger bay had offered to hook him up. 

It felt like it took him hours to drag Hux out of there, fretting with every step that Hux would wake up and doom them both, or that the pulse hammering under his palm would finally stop.

At least the turbolift was waiting and blessedly empty when he arrived at its doors. 

Unfortunately the floor space inside was narrower than the length of the General’s legs. 

The automatic door tried repeatedly to shut on them as Dopheld shuffled him inside, but the ‘body’ didn’t flinch. Nor was there any reaction when Dopheld began to manhandle his legs into the tight space. 

Had Dopheld just imagined that pulse? Was it a false hope created by an Alpha mind that couldn’t accept the death of its Omega? Hux wouldn’t have appreciated him thinking that way, so he did his best to stop and concentrate on the scene around him.

There was a bandage wrapped around Hux’s thigh over his uniform, a vivid circle of red blood soaking through the white fabric like a deliberate call for pity. 

Dopheld wondered where he had found white bandages. Then he felt guilty for questioning  _ that _ before he’d even thought to ask how Hux had first been hurt. 

He really hadn’t been paying attention on the bridge. He had no idea  _ why _ Pryde had tried to kill Hux. Pryde wasn’t exactly the sort of man who needed a reason, and besides Hux’s days had been numbered ever since Kylo Ren took control—the tension there had almost been a physical entity. Perhaps Kylo had ordered Pryde to do it for him.

Who else would have lashed out at Hux without making sure he was dead? Unless Hux had killed them before they could finish the job. That sounded likely, Dopheld knew he was still carrying his forearm knives—he’d felt them under his uniform as he dragged him away.

There were thousands for crew members onboard. It could have been anyone. The First Order wasn’t exactly the healthiest of societies these days. 

But Hux wasn’t the sort to field dress a wound so that anyone would notice, certainly not without even a bacta patch to heal the damage. He didn’t show weakness, unless he needed to…

None of these questions would help them now. Once he had Hux out of there, that would be the time to be asking about the finer details of the situation.

After what felt like hours, he finally got the General’s left ankle into a position where the door could shut. The lift hummed into life. Dopheld wasn’t sure he’d selected a floor for it.

The body at his feet made a noise that could have been a sigh. He hoped it wasn’t just air escaping.

“We’re alone, Sir,” Dopheld murmured as quietly as he could. They might be alone, but that didn’t guarantee their safety.

The answering moan was barely more than the previous exhalation, but it was something.

“Thank the stars.” The relief that washed over Dopheld was so strong he almost staggered. He wanted to drop to his knees and hug Hux, something he hadn’t done in years. He didn’t, of course—the doors could open at any moment if someone summoned the lift—but he imagined the action so vividly it was almost real.

Without opening his eyes Hux said, “take... my cylinders… my quarters.” 

He sounded as if breathing was causing him pain, which was understandable given the blaster burns across the chest of his uniform. Even with excellent body armour there might be broken ribs under there, and Hux wasn’t known for wearing that kind of body armour. 

Dopheld didn’t have time to investigate the extent of his injuries right now, though he encountered no fresh blood in the awkward process of freeing the code cylinders Hux always kept in his belt. 

Checking he had them all, Dopheld used his own to priority redirect the lift to the correct deck. Hopefully no one had deactivated Hux’s clearance yet. They’d need it if they were going to get off the ship. 

He had no plan and no time to ask Hux if he had anything in mind as the lift whirred to a stop.

Most officers opted for quarters near the lounge, or the gym, one of the other recreational amenities—Hux had always preferred to sleep as close to the bridge as possible.

The rest of the crew would have guessed that habit came from some imperious need to always be in control, but Dopheld had woken enough times in his bed to know it was more about an inability to get up at the start of a shift. The fewer steps it took to get onto the bridge the longer Hux could ignore his alarm.

Right now the proximity of the turbolift to his quarters made it much easier for Dopheld to avoid any passing patrols as they staggered together towards the door, which opened before they were even halfway across the corridor.

If he hadn’t been propelled forward by Hux’s weight slung across his shoulder Dopheld would have pulled back in fear. 

Hux’s quarters smelled so strongly of Alpha and Kylo Ren that the scents seemed to roll out like a physical force—it was hard to believe that the antichamber was empty. 

“He’s not here,” Hux mumbled darkly, slapping the door control as soon as they were past the threshold.

“What?” Dopheld hadn’t entirely registered the words—he was too busy looking around for the Supreme Leader. Instead he found Hux’s quarters in such a state of disarray that he had to assume Hux had been burgled.

“Ren is not here,” Hux repeated. He shuffled awkwardly towards a desk and began fishing around for something behind the drawer compartment. “He won’t be back any time soon. I doubt he’ll step foot in these rooms once Pryde tells him I’m dead. A cleaning crew will loot the place eventually.”

“Are you sure they didn’t already?”

The look Hux gave him was one of bone-deep weariness.

“Honestly, I wished they would.”

There were personal items strewn around every room, apparently abandoned wherever Ren had let them fall. There were leggings in the shower cubicle, plastered to the glass with moisture. The bedsheets bore stains that made Dopheld blush to his ears with embarrassment, jealousy, and a little guilt. 

Even Hux’s collection of alcoholic spirits had been raided and half the bottles smashed, though whether Hux or Ren was responsible for that Dopheld had no way to tell.

More to distract himself than anything else, Dopheld asked, “what’s the plan?”

“Plan?” Hux gave an oddly manic laugh that turned into a coughing fit and a groan. “I don’t have a plan! I have no idea why I’m not dead. I’m not all that convinced I’m alive. It doesn’t matter. You should leave, there’s no point in getting you court-martialed too.”

“You mean executed.”

Hux shrugged and turned to dragging something out of his wardrobe.

“You’re dismissed, Lieutenant.” He said without looking up.

“No.”

“Your career…”

“Doesn’t matter, Sir.” Dopheld said, knowing he was being insubordinate but no longer caring. “I won’t serve under Pryde now. I won’t follow an officer who thinks he has killed my Ome—my General.”

The answering sigh from Hux held rather more frustration that a single noise had any right to contain. What it  _ didn’t _ contain, was any kind of objection.

“Do you still have that stormtrooper armour, Sir?” Dopheld asked when the silence had dragged on for longer than they had time to waste.

Hux pointed under the bed. 

He’d had the armour made over a decade ago, as a junior officer and at great cost in terms of bribes to relevant individuals. The serial number was a ‘real’ one, that linked to a believable combat record. Somehow Hux had set it up to periodically update with details of minor missions that always involved enough troopers that this fictional person could have been there unnoticed.

Allegedly Hux had planned to use it to better get to know the people under his command, but by the time Dopheld first encountered it he was using it to travel anonymously around the ship. 

For most of their clandestine relationship the low level officers living near Dopheld’s quarters had assumed he was dating a trooper. That hadn’t helped his reputation. Given their difference in build a rumour had spread that Dopheld was in an Alpha/Alpha relationship, which had helped even less.

The armour was a little battered, but no more than most stormtroopers these days. Between the war and Phasma’s death, the shine had gone out of much of the corps. Literally and figuratively.

Dopheld half smiled at his own joke as he dragged the helmet out of its hiding place. The reflection in the visor looked like a man laughing on the way to his own gallows.

Something orange and furry dashed out from the space behind the helmet before vanishing under a pale blue couch that had seen better days.

“Damn it, Millie,” Hux grumbled. He seemed to be finished with the process of shoving items into a small nondescript bag. 

From his place across the room Dopheld couldn’t make out what he’d chosen to keep.

“So…” Hux began, then stopped when he failed to get back to his feet. He waved a hand as if rejecting help that Dopheld hadn’t offered yet, and twisted awkwardly to haul himself upright using the wardrobe door for support.

“We both know that armour won’t fit you, you’re too short in the limbs—the joints will lock up.” Hux said these words casually as if he wasn’t panting from the effort of standing.

“Of course not, and I don’t need to hide my face. You do.” Dopheld stepped forward with the first pieces ready in his hands. “We get you in this. We travel at normal speed down to the incinerators. At least if my code cylinders are recorded as going that way it should put off any suspicion for a little while.”

Hux nodded. “I might be able to reprogram the droids so they believe my body was delivered and destroyed.”

“Then we get… some kind of ship out of here. I’m not privy to our current complement so I can’t comment on that. Anything that will get us away. Assuming you don’t want to lead a coup?”

The manic laugh returned. So did the coughing. “I don’t care anymore, Lieutenant. This isn’t my First Order. I was expecting to die here, I have no preference for what I do next.”

“We still might.” Dopheld said as he helped Hux to remove his tunic. The padded second layer was also burned and similarly discarded, but Hux kept his long sleeve black undershirt on since it was functionally the same as a Stormtrooper’s base layer.

“What?”

“We might still die. And I’m not a Lieutenant any more. Not after this.”

“You are as long as we’re on this ship—standards might have slipped but no one is going to trust a stormtrooper addressing a Lieutenant by his first name.” Hux unfastened his jodhpurs, then dropped inelegantly onto the sofa to kick off his boots. There was blaster wound half way up his left thigh. It looked angry. “There should be leggings in my size in that cabinet.”

Dopheld had already reached for the correct drawer, Hux was a man of habit. He tried not to see the selection of sex toys shoved under the clothes. He’d never had any personal interest in them, but he recognised an Omega chastity belt when he saw one.

Getting Hux into his armour took less time than he would have expected. Despite the limitations of his wounds, they still had the easy familiarity of long association on their side—if in his younger days Dopheld could get Hux out of this armour in the dark, he could get him into it in an emergency.

“Is there anything you need from your quarters?” Hux asked as he fastened the last few clasps.

His first thought was to say ‘no’ simply so they could leave sooner, but they’d taken the time to pack Hux’s things. If Dopheld was leaving everything behind…

“Yes,” he said, “not much. My quarters aren’t far from the incinerators anyway.”

“Good, take these,” Hux handed him yet more cylinders. They were matt black rather than standard silver.

“Whose are these?”

“Ren’s. He doesn’t take his personal shuttle anywhere anymore—he’s always with those Knights of his—so it’s just sitting in the hangar, fueled and ready. We can make it look like he sent it out. Not even Pryde will question that, provided Ren isn’t on the bridge at the time. He rarely bothers these days.”

“I thought you didn’t have a plan?”

Hux gave him a close approximation of a smile before he pulled the stormtrooper helmet down over his face. “I always scored highest in high-pressure simulations.”

* * *

An old image of Dopheld with his parents before their deaths, the contraband casualwear Hux had gifted him years ago that he’d never felt brave enough to wear, several knives, and a small bag of mixed currency. 

That was all he had to show for thirty two years of life.

It felt like a metaphor somehow, but he hadn’t the time to think it through.

Hux had easily convinced the droids that they had disposed of his corpse, and even with trembling hands he’d managed to spoof the request for Ren’s shuttle. 

Something was going on in the other hangar. 

Stormtroopers were streaming in that direction, and didn’t even glance at a mere Lieutenant walking with purpose against the tide. Dopheld did his best to keep his face straight despite the warring feelings of concern and relief that a problem was clearing their path. It felt like there was a sign above his head, telling everyone that he was running away.

Fortunately, Hux was right about the readiness of Ren’s shuttle so there was no one but droids around it as they approached. The ramp began retracting as soon as Dopheld passed the threshold, which must have been triggered by the presence of the code cylinders in his pocket. 

As soon as they were inside Hux was already trying to open a panel that by all logic should not have opened. Dopheld had to help him, simply getting this far seemed to have burned away what little energy he had.

The panel concealed a smuggler’s compartment with shielding that was clearly meant to hide any evidence of the lifeforms inside. It was a feature that had absolutely no place inside a First Order vessel, but something had always been off about Kylo Ren. At least the shuttle didn’t smell as badly of that Alpha as Hux’s quarters had done.

Sitting there in the dark as the autopilot silently took them into hyperspace might have been the single most terrifying thing Dopheld had ever done. They could be discovered at any moment and they wouldn’t know until the ship was hit. 

Beside him Hux was audibly shaking in his armour, but whether that was through fear or exhaustion Dopheld wouldn’t want to guess. Every so often a fit of coughing shook him more violently than before, the sound weirdly distorted by the helmet.

Hours seemed to pass before Hux finally signalled that it was safe to emerge. According to the chronometer in the cockpit it been closer to eight minutes. The chronometer had to be lying.

When Hux removed his helmet to reveal a grey face and hair dripping with sweat Dopheld wanted to insist that he get some rest, but they both knew there wasn’t time for that.

Instead Dopheld stood nervously by, handing Hux tools and holding objects in place, while the ship was stripped of every system that could remotely redirect it or give away its identity to other ships. Some of those parts were kept for trade, some were smashed, and two were thrown out of the airlock. 

Of course, they would still have to dump the ship itself somewhere—the Upsilon class was far too recognisable—but they’d gained a little breathing room.

“Will it be enough?” Dopheld asked quietly when Hux dropped into the jump seat, barely able to sit upright.

“Who knows.” 

“Do we have a heading?”

“Jakku.”

That wasn’t the answer Dopheld was expecting. Sadly he couldn’t question it further because Hux had already fallen asleep.

* * *

Since Jakku wasn’t an official First Order holding, it seemed like a sensible idea to disguise themselves before they landed on the planet.

Feeling a little guilty for invading Hux’s personal space while he slept, Dopheld had stripped off the white panels of his armour to leave him in the more inconspicuous black of his undershirt and leggings. There were a few scorch marks across his chest, but no actual holes in the fabric. It was strange. A blaster bolt strong enough to toss a grown man across a room should not have behaved like that.

Once he’d made sure Hux was unremarkable, Dopheld changed his own clothes for the dark blue/green set of casualwear that he’d picked up from his quarters. The fit was loose enough to make him seem bigger than he really was, as well as hiding the various weapons he’d kept on his person. 

He might be giving up the uniform but there was no way he’d give up the blaster.

He borrowed a needle from the medical kit stowed by the door. On second thoughts he took the whole kit and placed it into the side pocket of Hux’s bag. They would probably need it.

Taking his place in the pilot’s seat—more out of a feeling of unease over the autopilot than out of any sort of competency at flying—he set to tearing his tunic apart to make head coverings.

There weren’t many redheads in the galaxy and they didn’t have time to dye Hux’s hair.

If concentrating on sewing meant he didn’t have a reason to stare at the sleeping form next to him, well that was just a bonus.

* * *

They’d let the Upsilon shuttle suffer what Hux called a ‘controlled fuck-up’ into the sand a few miles from Niima Outpost, having first thrown the majority of their identifying belongings out of an airlock just before they broke atmosphere. 

The ship was badly damaged enough that it wouldn’t fly immediately, while still being an attractive prospect to the local scavengers. Someone would eat well off that particular find. Or they’d get killed for it.

Jakku was a cutthroat world when it needed to be, and the local junk trader was no exception. After the First Order’s airstrike on the outpost the ship trade had become a seller’s market—few ships had survived intact enough to fly. Unkar Plutt knew he could charge whatever he liked for trash that was hardly even space worthy.

Hux had been exhausted by the circuitous walk from the crash site. A life-long occupant of climate controlled ships he would have struggled in the desert sands even without his injuries, but in his current state Dopheld had almost been forced to carry him at times.

Still, he’d managed to stay alert long enough to assess the various ships on offer, establish which would be best suited to them, and work out what extras they would need to get it off the ground. 

Dopheld hadn’t understood about forty percent of the things Hux muttered under his breath. He hoped it wasn’t important. Especially since Hux was too tired by that point, so he was the one stuck doing the ‘negotiating’. 

Not that what he did could really be called a negotiation. It was more like being very slowly robbed by a repellent alien who seemed to be able to smell both desperation and wealth. 

They’d paid almost ninety thousand credits for a HWK-290 light freighter and parts. Hux had said the ship was worth barely fifty, but he’d handed Dopheld his valuables like he didn’t care. 

First Order personnel received very little income since they were fed and housed by the Order—Dopheld had never even thought to imagine that much money in one person’s hands. The fact that it was in  _ his _ hands made his knees weak. Unkar had to pull on the bag to get it away from him. 

“Hmmm... Correllian…” was the only comment as he counted out the metallic chips, though Correllian  _ what _ Dopheld couldn’t see. Hux only shrugged.

If the trader had seemed disinterested in the money, the ship parts from the Upsilon shuttle got little more than a raised eyebrow. How much First Order wreckage passed through here these days?

It didn’t matter. They had a ship that wouldn’t draw any attention now, other than the occasional look of disgust, or possibly pity.

The ship had to be at least sixty years old, and it seemed like someone had left the vents open for much of that time because it was full of sand. Everything on Jakku was full of sand, including Dopheld’s underwear. 

Jakku was a miserable place, that he hoped never to have to go back to ever again.

“Out of all the worlds in the galaxy, why did you bring us here?” He muttered half to himself as he looked around the main compartment in that hope that there might be a broom hidden somewhere onboard.

“Because if Ren gets it into his thick skull to look for me, he won’t think to look here.” Hux sighed. He was leaning against one of the sand-covered bunks with his leg held out at an awkward angle. “The ships here are overpriced and awful. This thing is sixty years old, at least. He’s only seen me in the fleet, with our polished floors and the newest of everything because Snoke insisted. If he looks for me, he’ll seek out our existing contacts and trade partners first. He’ll expect me to want luxury. He won’t expect this.”

“And will he? Look for you, I mean?” Dopheld kept his eyes turned firmly away as he asked this, unable to force himself to ask the things he really wanted to know. Like what Hux and Ren had been to each other? Whether they’d actually mated or if it was just a fling? If he’d have to fight another Alpha for his Omega?

He really had to stop thinking like that. He thought he’d grown out of it. They’d been so many years apart, but put them in an enclosed space for a few hours and he was already falling back into his old habits.

“My death probably won’t bother him, but running away? I don’t think he’d let that slide if he knew.” After a moment of silence Hux clapped his hands together. “Right, we have work to do. I have a plan for getting the sand out of here but it involves getting anything that’s not bolted down secured, and then making sure the cockpit is airtight.”

Dopheld snorted. “You’re going to open all the doors in low orbit aren’t you?”

“This is why I’ve always liked you, Pheld, you can read my mind.” Hux said with a smile that clearly wasn’t comfortable on his face.

“No, I’m remembering that incident in the academy, with the TIE cockpit full of popcorn,” He replied, trying not to blush or grin like an idiot at hearing Hux use his old nickname.

Hux laughed, and this time the pleasure was genuine. “It wasn’t popcorn, it was packing material that I sold to Rodinon as popcorn.”

“He ate it all the same.” Dopheld said, finally relaxing enough to laugh himself. 

Less than a day ago he’d thought he was going to be disposing of this man’s body, now they might both be getting a second chance. 

A second chance at what exactly he wasn’t sure. 

Anything was better than nothing.


	2. Chapter 2

There was a thunk as a screwdriver unexpectedly embedded itself into the padded bulkhead just outside the cockpit, where it vibrated for a few moments before dropping to the deck. 

Dopheld watched it roll until Hux snatched it up again, then turned back to his own task with a muffled yawn. 

“Nothing on this frelling ship works!” Hux hissed from the access channel he was currently laid in, poking at the unlit panels in front of him as if he could threaten them into reactivating. 

“The atmospherics work, and the artificial gravity, about seventy percent of the electrics, the blast do—”

“Oh, stop being positive! That’s an order!”

“You’re not a General now, Hux.” Dopheld replied, though he mostly muttered the words into his hand.

“I bloody am!”

Shaking his head, Dopheld decided not to engage in that argument any further. He wouldn’t win. 

To say tempers were fraying would be an understatement—they were both coming apart at the seams.

Dopheld well remembered the days when Hux would pull several all-nighters in a row and come back to his quarters more than a little out of his mind. Few people ever really experienced him behaving like that, so he didn’t like anyone to draw attention to it. Hux would just sulk. More so. 

From Dopheld’s point of view the repairs were going pretty well despite them both running on fumes. They’d managed to make the ship fit to go into orbit; cleared the sand as well as several small animals that had been nesting in the cargo bay; and they had most of the important functions online—all done in one afternoon on no food, and in Dopheld’s case no sleep.

They couldn’t really ask for more than that.

Hux  _ would _ ask for more than that, he always did. He was a perfectionist, and Dopheld suspected he was trying to avoid ever stopping to think. 

Dopheld yawned so hugely he felt sure his jaw had dislocated.

They would have to stop soon. 

Even with stimulants and the short nap Hux has managed in the shuttle they’d been awake too long. Someone would get electrocuted soon if they weren’t careful.

Once Hux had the little shield generator online and Dopheld had finished reconnecting the proximity sensors he was going to insist that they get some sleep. 

He was also going to get a bacta patch on Hux’s leg and try to check his chest regardless of how awkward that might be. HUx said he’d just been knocked unconscious but that didn’t account for the coughing—there could be internal bleeding or broken bones under there. 

Could a blaster bolt damage lungs or a heart without killing a person? Probably, even a punch to the sternum at the wrong moment could be deadly. Really, Hux could die at any mo—

Dopheld yelped as the wirecutter in his right hand missed its target and snipped a chunk out of his finger instead. 

When he had last sleeped? 

No, wait. That wasn’t a word. It wasn’t a sentence either. 

When was the last time he slept? 

He’d woken up for his final shift as a Lieutenant of the First Order about ten hours before Hux was shot. How long ago was that?

He stared at the console in front of him as if a blank screen could help him tell the time. He suddenly couldn’t think straight, like the cut on his finger had let the last of his energy drain away. 

“You’re bleeding into the circuitry,” a voice said by his ear. It made him smile even if he couldn’t entirely focus on the words. “You look like death, Pheld. Come on, let’s get this stopped before you ruin anything else with bodily fluids.”

A comment about that not being his kind of thing rose up in his throat, but he didn’t manage to vocalise it. Someone had manoeuvred him onto the edge of a soft bunk and he’d always been excellent at sleeping anywhere.

* * *

His pillow was warm. 

The pillow wasn’t especially soft—in fact one might call it sort of bony—but it also wasn’t the disappointingly flat pancake of a pillow he’d had in his quarters for the last six months, so he’d call it an improvement.

Whatever had woken him up it wasn’t his alarm. 

If it wasn’t his alarm it wasn’t worth noticing.

He wrapped an arm around his pillow, snuggled closer, and sank back into the—

His pillow coughed.

Oh, he was in Hux’s quarters. 

That would explain the ‘pillow’. 

Shifting a little Dopheld pressed a kiss to whatever part of Hux was under him and let himself relax. 

If his alarm hadn’t sounded yet then it would be ages until Hux’s went off. Lots of time to be comfortable. Lots of time to sleep. 

Hux prodded him in the side. It wasn’t a gentle prod.

“Need to piss.”

Ah yes, the famed Omega bladder, smaller than a koja nut, especially at this time of his cycle. Dopheld released his grip, let Hux slide out of bed, and immediately shuffled over into the warm spot. Hux always kept his quarters on the frigid side.

“Oh of course this doesn’t bloody work either!” The shout was only a little muffled, like Hux hadn’t quite closed the door to the fresher.

Dopheld chuckled. Maintenance would be in for it now.

Hadn’t Hux said something about things not working in his weird dream last night?

“We need to add plumbing to the list,” Hux said, sitting down on the edge of the mattress so his backside was snuggly seated in the curve formed by Dopheld’s legs and torso.

“Hmm.” Dopheld wrapped his arms around Hux’s middle and pressed his face against his hip. “I had a dream about us last night. It was crazy—some melodramatic Alpha wizard in a mask ruined literally everything.”

Hux sighed. “That wasn’t a dream.”

“What about if I go back to sleep, will it become a dream then?”

“No.”

“Shit.”

“Yep.”

“So,” Dopheld said with his eyes stubbornly closed, “let me recap—we broke up nearly three years ago because our relationship was, and I quote ‘inappropriate’; Starkiller is gone; so is Snoke; Ren is Supreme Leader; we’re on the run because Allegiant General Pryde shot you; and I should probably let you go now?”

“Correct on all but two counts.”

“Do I get to choose which two? Because I’d get rid of Ren twice, just to be sure.”

“Sorry, but no.”

Hux had chosen where he was sitting, and didn’t seem to be making any move to get out of Dopheld’s grasp, so he was going to believe that needing to let him go was one of the incorrect facts for now.

“Is Snoke secretly alive?” He asked.

Hux sighed again, with significantly more feeling this time. 

A cold hand settled over one of his own.

“No, he’s dead. I saw the two halves of his corpse. Parts of it were on fire.” There was a pause that seemed to drag on for hours before Hux continued uncomfortably, “Look... I didn’t end it for propriety's sake. No one in high command really cares about inter-rank relationships, they wouldn’t get laid if they did—they’ll all too busy trying to kill each other for more than the occasional hatefuck in a closet. The First Order needs children, that’s what Snoke always said.”

Hux was speaking quietly but to Dopheld’s mind he might as well have been shouting.

It seemed that he didn’t need to worry about odd dreams because he’d just woken up in his own worst nightmare. Hadn’t he told himself that was Hux’s real reason? Even though Hux had always said he couldn’t risk a child in his position, and had never wanted one because of his own childhood, hadn’t Dopheld sometimes wondered if that was a lie?

“So you ended it because I’m asexual?” Dopheld asked, dreading the answer. They’d gone over this so many times when they were together, and Hux had  _ always _ said that didn’t matter. Even if it had… “You know that I would have done anything for you. I love… I love **d** you. If you’d just asked me. I’m not squeamish. I eat rations I don’t find appealing all the—”

Hux gave an oddly breathy laugh. It was only when something wet dropped onto Dopheld’s arm that he realised he might be crying. 

It was an old joke they’d made a lot in happier times, when they’d shared meals and beds together. He would steal the jogan fruit cake from Hux’s tray because Hux didn’t like it, and at night he’d hold Hux close while he pleasured himself because Dopheld didn’t need it but he liked to see Hux satisfied. 

There had been balance there once. He’d been happy. He thought Hux had been happy too. 

“Pheld, we’ve talked about this,” Hux said with a sort of uncertain amusement in his voice, “I understand your point of view, but I don’t want to be compared to the cold semolina or—”

“Cold semolina? Armitage Hux, you are a fine lean steak.” Dopheld replied in an ill-advised attempt at humour.

“And in this metaphor you’re a vegetarian.”

“That’s not—”

“For fucks sake, _ I loved you _ , I ended it because I didn’t want you to die!” Hux shouted over him. The words echoed through the mostly empty cargo hold in a way that made the hairs at the back of Dopheld’s neck stand on end.

He had thought he was getting upset before, but at that shout a wave of cold nausea washed over him. He felt alone despite the man literally in his arms. He wondered if Hux felt the same.

Hux took a deep breath, then coughed. With his head still pressed against Hux’s side, Dopheld could hear the unhealthy creaking of something inside him.

“Snoke made me stop my suppressants. Because Ren was an Alpha. I don’t know if Snoke had an actual plan or if he thought we’d just instantly be on each other like ash-rabbits,” Hux sneered at the thought. A sneer doesn’t usually have a noise, but Dopheld could picture his expression from his tone of voice all the same.

“I had been fine with being on the suppressants—heats are awful—though maybe if it  _ had _ just been  _ us _ I could have made peace with asking you to fuck me, but it wasn’t just us... I didn’t want to risk Ren smelling you on me and killing you as a rival. Even if we came to an arrangement and you were comfortable sharing a space with an Omega in heat—”

“Which I would have been,” Dopheld snapped, his patience with Hux wearing thin with each admission that he’d made such permanent decisions for him. Once he might have been able to maintain his deference for Hux’s higher rank, but they were beyond that now.

“And I understand that, as strange as it made me feel sometimes. But I couldn’t protect you, I was third in command of the whole fleet and I couldn’t protect  _ myself _ from either of them—you saw what Ren used to do to the Finalizer at the slightest setbacks.”

“He almost killed me over that droid escaping from Jakku.” Dopheld rubbed his neck at the memory.

Hux mirrored the action. “When Snoke died… and on Crait… and…” he sighed, “Pheld, the last year hasn’t been easy.”

“We’re alone now. We’re free.”

Dopheld tried to place a soothing hand on Hux’s back as he spoke but Hux went so still that he stopped breathing for a moment. 

“You don’t know what I had to do. You don’t know what I  _ chose _ to do. Nothing is that simple.”

Before Dopheld could say anything else, reassuring or otherwise, Hux was on his feet. The conversation was over.

“Come on, we have a ship to fix.” Hux said in the tone he’d always used for giving orders. “We don’t have time for this.”

Almost immediately he toppled sideways. 

“Fine.” Dopheld sighed, “but I’m looking at that leg first.”

* * *

The leg wound was infected, though not badly enough for Dopheld to feel too guilty that he hadn’t insisted that they treat it sooner. Hux should be doing more to take care of himself, he wasn’t a child and Dopheld wasn’t responsible for him. Those words sounded like a lie even in the privacy of his own head.

Hux had been shot through his uniform, the burnt fibres of which had then been pressed into the wound by the bandage he’d added. It took half an hour for Dopheld, who was crouching awkwardly in front of him, to remove all the threads while trying not to look at the marks on the rest of Hux’s legs. 

He recognised those handprints. He’d once spent several weeks watching one of them fade from his own throat. He wondered what else Ren had done, and what Hux had meant when he said he’d ‘chosen’ to do things. What things?

If there were additional injuries on Hux’s chest Dopheld couldn’t tell around the bruises.

He looked like he’d been punched by a rancor, or someone had painted him to be a rather off-putting practice target. The heaviest bruise lay over his heart, with another sort of rough ring configuration starting about a handspan from the first. 

Pryde’s aim had been true. 

“Were you wearing body armour?” Dopheld asked as he tried to test the stability of Hux’s ribs without actually touching his skin. 

Now that they were properly awake, Dopheld was horrified by how his mouth had run away with him before. He’d  _ snuggled  _ with his former commanding officer three years after their relationship ended. The discomfort in that thought made touching him now feel like a violation.

The tenderness suggested some ribs were cracked. There was a tube of topical pain relief gel in the medkit he’d stolen, but it wouldn’t go far. Hux would have to manage the best he could.

“You saw me undress,” Hux said without looking down, “I was just wearing the slash proof layer I always wore.”

When they’d been together Dopheld had jokingly called that piece of clothing Hux’s Alpha Disguise. 

Hux had very narrow shoulders, and delicate limbs. The First Order officer uniform was designed for a breadth of torso he just didn’t have, so he’d taken to wearing padding to keep the lines of his tunic pristine. That the fabric was ‘slash proof’ was just an added bonus.

“And did you… have a plan with Allegiant General Pryde?” 

The look of disgust Hux gave him confirmed that the question was a stupid one.

Dopheld tried again, “what about the stormtrooper he took the blaster from?”

“I couldn’t have told you who was on the bridge at that moment, Pheld, I was rather stressed at the time.” Hux paused, his mouth twisting into an odd moue of distaste. “I’d just helped the Resistance infiltrators to escape.”

It felt like someone had poured ice water down Dopheld’s spine.

“You did what?” He asked, trying to convince himself that he’d misheard.

“I’d been sharing intelligence with the Resistance.”

Dopheld couldn’t help it, he sat back onto the deck out of pure shock. His Hux, his Om—stop it—his General, the man whose leadership he’d believed in for over a decade, had  _ betrayed  _ the First Order.

Yes, it could be argued that in deserting Dopheld was betraying that same institution right now, but he’d done it for love, to keep Hux alive, he hadn’t—

“Why?!” He hadn’t meant to shout but his emotions got the better of him. “When? What did you do? Did  _ you _ drop the shields on Starkiller? What about the Supremacy?! All those resources! All those troops!”

It shouldn’t be possible for a man dressed in nothing but underwear to look so imperious and deadly, but in that moment Hux managed it. If he had stabbed Dopheld there and then it wouldn’t have been a surprise, despite him having no obvious place to hide a knife.

“ **_NO!_ ** ” Hux snapped back. “I was  _ not _ responsible for  _ any  _ of that! Starkiller was Phasma’s doing! The Supremacy was… well… that was a shitshow... mostly of Ren and Snoke’s design…” 

He seemed to deflate, as if standing up straight for a few seconds had exhausted him so much he couldn’t keep a grip on his rage. When he began to speak again his words were barely audible.

“I only did it when we knew Palpatine’s message was real, and I did it because Ren couldn’t be allowed to win. He took everything from me. He perverted the First Order from it’s rightful path in search of the  _ Sith _ of all things.” Hux spat the word like it was a curse. “Palpatine is alive and we were all just his puppets. Everything we worked for was a lie,  _ everything. _ ”

How could Dopheld possibly know what to believe? 

Part of him—the animal part that had first scented Hux all those years ago and labelled him ‘mine’—believed every word that had ever come from his Omega’s mouth. 

The loyal soldier in him was screaming. He’d been raised in the First Order fleet. He’d sat at his parents’ feet while they told tales of the Empire, because devotion could almost fill a hungry belly when food was scarce. He’d lived his entire life for this cause.

His rational mind told him that it had been the Republic that had taken everything, from everyone. The united galaxy had been shattered and left as spoils for dishonest politicians to pick over like carrion birds. 

Of course, the First Order hadn’t done much in the last year to actually improve that, and there was something sinister about the Allegiant General’s forces that Dopheld had never trusted but… 

Hux had put lifetimes of work in jeopardy because  _ he didn’t like Kylo Ren? _

“I can’t do this right now,” he said at last, staring at the deck between his knees rather than meeting Hux’s furious expression. “I can’t… I’m sorry, Armitage, I need some time.”

He heard the intake of breath that followed his use of Hux’s first name, a name they never ever used, but he didn’t have the space in his head to feel bad about that. His chest feel like it was imploding. 

It was all he could do to scramble away to the cockpit where he could close the door and shut out most of the situation.

What had he done?

* * *

The cockpit had been a poor choice for a hiding place—the windows showed him nothing but the vast emptiness of space. The darkness seemed to draw on his spiralling thoughts until he felt like his physical form was dissolving into atoms of anxiety, each one as isolated as the stars themselves.

He couldn’t let himself wallow in such ridiculous melodramatics, so he turned his back to eternity and reached for the comms unit. 

The system needed to be repaired if they were ever going to land anywhere bigger than a one-bantha-outpost, and working was better than having an existential crisis.

Plus, if they could communicate they would have options for the future. 

Dopheld might find out what was happening with the fleet.

Maybe he could go home before it was too late.

The word ‘home’ didn’t feel right when he knew Hux wouldn’t be part of it.

He was letting his mind wander again. 

Something growled.

Dopheld froze. Was something in here with him? Surely not. The cockpit was a few feet across and they’d opened the rest of the ship to space for a few minutes to clean it—what could possibly have survived that?

The growling returned, louder than before, and to his embarrassment Dopheld realised the sound was coming from his own damn stomach.

When was the last time he ate? 

He’d had a mixed nutrient bar at the midpoint of his last shift. That had been… he still didn’t know how long ago. At least a day, maybe two.

He glanced at the readout he’d been working on before he cut his hand. Hux had powered it back on so that the proximity sensors were working, but the chronometer just flashed 00:00.

Some escape plan this was turning out to be. 

He was so used to taking food from a dispenser, or the mess hall, that it had never occurred to him to bring any with him. The worst part was that they had covered all of this in basic training and he hadn’t even grabbed a ration pack.

Hux’s bag was still on the floor behind the pilot’s seat. Had he brought food? Knowing Hux he’d probably have brought more stimulant tabs in place of rations, but it  _ was _ a regulation to bring food and Hux was very meticulous about regulations.

Dopheld knew he was stalling on just going back there to ask him, because that would require making eye contact and thinking about what Hux had done, again, and he didn’t think he could—

His stomach made a noise that was usually associated with the dianoga that lived in the garbage processors.

Okay, stop thinking and do something.

He opened the cockpit door. 

The two rows of bunks in the living quarters were empty. All the access panels were in place. What he could see of the cargo hold seemed to be in a similar condition. Somewhere at the end of the ship he could hear pipes clanging. 

Hux was busy.

Dopheld could probably just… peek in the bag, and see if there was any food. 

There was no point walking the whole length of the ship if Hux hadn’t actually brought anything they could eat.

He knew that his reasoning was complete mynockcrap but he was hungry beyond caring.

He unzipped the main compartment of the bag.

There were nutrient bars right at the top. Perfect, he wouldn’t have to go digging through Hux’s things to find food.

The first bar he picked up turned out to be nothing but an empty wrapper covered in strange puncture marks.

Why would Hux pack an empty wrapper?

The next one was the same but Dopheld barely noticed because underneath it was something orange, and furry. 

What the...

A green eye appeared in the middle of the furry mass. 

This time the growling wasn’t his stomach.

He reached for the zip but he wasn’t fast enough—whatever the orange thing was it leapt out of the bag and darted through the cockpit door.

Instinctively Dopheld gave chase but he couldn’t catch up with the creature before it had disappeared into the refresher.

Hux screamed. 

Dopheld crashed to a stop against a bulkhead.

“Argh! What the fu— _ Millie?! _ ” Hux sounded delighted, which was a tone of voice Dopheld was pretty sure he’d never heard from him before. Smug and sardonic, yes, delighted not so much. It didn’t last. “Wait, no, Millie, stop, that’s not plumbed in… oh, for fucks sake.”

When Hux stepped out of the refresher he was rubbing the bridge of his nose as if he was getting a migraine, and as such he didn’t see Dopheld standing outside until Dopheld stepped back to avoid a collision.

“Oh! There you are. Where did you find her?” Hux asked, pressing the door closure button so neither of them had to witness the odd little quadruped making use of the unfortunately disassembled facilities.

“She? Oh uh, she was in your bag. I’m afraid she’s eaten some of your rations. What is it?” Dopheld asked this more as a distraction from Hux realising he’d been in his bag, than out of any real interest.

“Millicent is a cat, it’s a type of feline. Ben found her a couple of years ago during a mission and gave her to me as a gift, to keep me company,” Hux said. “I thought I’d left her behind on the Steadfast. She must have hidden herself in the bag. Have you never seen a cat before? Some smugglers use them to control vermin on their ships. They can be clever when they want to be.”

Dopheld shook his head. That’s what droids were for. “Who is Ben?”

Hux didn’t seem to hear the question. Instead he turned back to the door control. The creature appeared to be wailing. There was also a disquieting scratching sound. 

It was easier to see the cat’s features now she wasn’t running around at high speed. Her face was rather beautiful in a haughty kind of away, her fur precisely matched her owner’s hair, and when she stretched she revealed unexpectedly sharp claws that made the gesture more like a threat.

There couldn’t be a more Hux-appropriate animal in the galaxy.

“So, you were looking for rations?” Hux asked. He wasn’t actually looking at Dopheld, instead he was studying the wall panel to his left as if it were the most fascinating thing he’d ever seen.

“Yes, sorry, I should have asked.”

Hux only shrugged and led the way back to the cockpit. He was walking a little easier than he had been, though the stairs between the cargo hold and living quarters still slowed him down. The cat followed at his heels, apparently trying to rub her cheeks against any part of his leg that she could reach.

The bag was still on the floor where Dopheld had left it, clearly unzipped more than the cat could possibly manage without opposable thumbs.

“I only tried to pick up two bars,” he said carefully, “I realised they were empty and then Magnificent here jumped out. I had nearly had a heart attack.”

Hux snorted, “what did you call her?” 

He crouched down on his right leg, the left held out sideways to keep pressure off his wound, and began to dig through the bag. The main compartment did seem to be mostly ration packs, though they were all a bit squashed now.

“Uh…” Dopheld thought he’d said it correctly.

“It’s Mill-ee-sent, though I’m sure she’d be very happy to be called Magnificent.” He didn’t smile but the corners of his mouth twitched like they were considering the idea. “Here, eat this.”

It was a pouch of dehydrated jogan fruit cake. It was still warm. Dopheld tried not to wonder what part of the cat had been laying on it. He did wonder why Hux had packed it given that he hated jogan fruit. Had he brought it just for him? He couldn’t bear to ask.

Moving awkwardly Hux sat down in the pilot’s seat and cracked the cap off his own pouch of food. Protein slurry #7, a grey gelatinous food stuff that provided everything a human needed provided that said human had no sense of taste, smell, or texture. For some reason Hux had always loved the stuff.

They ate in silence, Millicent winding around Hux’s boots making an odd rumbling noise like a distant engine.

Eating from ration pouches wasn’t exactly a complex task, certainly not one that kept your hands or mind busy. Desperate for something to do, Dopheld found himself fiddling with the half finished comms unit he’d abandoned earlier. 

There was a static hiss from the speakers, a few pops, and then—music.

Millicent gave a strangled ‘merow’ and bolted from the room, her tail fluffed up to three times its usual width.

“What is that?” Dopheld asked, leaning towards the speaker as if proximity would help him make out the lyrics, even though they clearly weren’t in Basic.

“That’s a Sullustan victory song,” Hux quietly.

“Huh.”

Without realising he was doing it Dopheld shifted his grip slightly on the wiring. A brief shower of sparks cascaded over his hand and the song was replaced by chatter. He must have changed the frequency.

“...ave you ever seen anything like it?” The first voice crowed. It sounded almost drunk. “All those ships! Who knew the galaxy had so many people on its side? The battle to end all battles!”

“That’s what we said when we got rid of the Death Stars! Both of them!” The second voice sounded older, but only marginally more sober.

The first voice laughed. “Oh yes, I forgot we had Wedge Antilles: Rebel Hero flying with us!”

“Which was more impressive, eh Wedge?” A third voice joined in. “This battle or the second Death Star—considering the emperor didn’t  _ actually  _ die last time.”

“The second Death Star doesn’t even compare. Every one of those star destroyers was a planet killer.” Wedge said flatly. “Every. Single. One.”

Hux looked at Dopheld, his face expressionless.

“You remember the superlaser the Death Stars had?” Wedge continued. “They all had one. It was one of those ships that destroyed Kijimi, if even a part of that fleet had made it out of there…”

The third voice made a whistling noise, “I’m glad no one told us that on the way in, I’d have needed a new flight suit!”

Dopheld frowned. Where was Kijimi? He mouthed the name at Hux who reached over to make sure their own microphones were muted.

“It was one of the planets that was resisting our—I mean First Order—rule.”

“Did you know about the weapons?”

Rather than making eye contact Hux lifted Millicent into his lap where she immediately curled up. As he spoke he let his fingers drift over her back.

“No. I knew there was  _ something _ but I hadn’t been privy to details for a while. Ren—Ren knew he couldn’t trust me. He kept me around, for what I was, but my role was never the same after Snoke died.”

“Do you think Ren is dead?” Dopheld asked. His brain wanted to ask larger questions than that but right now he couldn’t frame them. Not yet.

“—ot rid of them and we’ll clean up whatever’s left of the First Order too,” the third voice said, the conversation having continues while Hux spoke.

“We could ask,” Hux suggested. His tone was ironic but his face was hard to read.

“How? ‘Oh excuse me gentleman, is my former boss still alive?’ If they’re in range they’ll fire on us immediately!”

“Tell them he killed your sister on Jakku,” Hux said, “and that you want to know if you can stop your quest for vengeance. It’s believable. Ren had a lot of blood on his hands. Say we’re sorry that we couldn’t take part in the battle too, it’ll make them trust us.”

Dopheld opened his mouth to object but Hux was giving him the exact same look he always wore on the bridge of the Finalizer, and somehow it resetted his brain to obedience.

“Hello?” He said with the pilot’s headset held inexpertly to his ear. “Sorry to interrupt, did you say the First Order has been defeated?”

“Who is this?” The first voice asked sharply.

“Tidge Ami of the Orange Feline,” he improvised out of nowhere, “I’m afraid we suffered a near total systems failure so we couldn’t get to the battle. Is it really over?”

“Mostly,” Wedge replied, “there’s always a few strays to clean up, some defectors to welcome to our side.”

Hux shook his head at that.

Dopheld rolled his eyes—he wasn’t stupid, he knew Hux would be recognised even if Dopheld wanted to accept the offer, which he didn’t.

“Do you if Kylo Ren was killed? That bastard slaughtered my sister and her mate on Jakku, I’d rest easier knowing he was dead.”

“I don’t know,” Wedge said at the same moment the other two said, “I heard he defected” and “he vanished like a mirage.” 

“A battle that size we might never know,” Wedge continued, “it’s an easy thing for someone to disappear when there are thousands dead. Maybe someone who witnessed something will come forward, but Luke told us Palpatine died and that was wrong, so I guess even the most trusted sources can’t always be right.”

“Thank you anyway,” Dopheld said. When he looked to Hux for guidance, Hux was staring blankly out at the stars.

“Do you need any help with your repairs?” Wedge asked.

“We'll be fine, you go celebrate, it sounds like you deserve to relax now.”

“Thanks, good luck to you. The resistance could always use more ships on their side, once you’re up and running again.”

“We’ll keep that in mind.” Dopheld said before he released the wires and put down the headset. The comm unit hissed for a second before it went dark.

He turned to Hux, but Hux was gone. 

Perhaps he should have followed him, and tried to make him talk, but he’d just found out that everyone else he’d ever known with was dead, or gone, or defected. 

From the far end of the ship he heard the sound of pipes clanging again.

Half blinded by tears he picked up his own tools and turned back to the control panels.

* * *

When Dopheld finally stumbled into the living quarters at he didn’t know what time because they still hadn’t set the clock, he found that Hux had cleared off all the bunks. 

There was a row of three lozenge-shaped padded alcoves running along each wall. Every alcove had a mattress, a light and some kind of personal storage space. 

At some point there would have had panels of safety webbing to keep the sleeping occupants safe in the event of turbulence, however those had all rotted away years ago.

Most of the mattresses looked like something had been living in them at some point, and others had rather distressing stains, but the one closest to the cockpit looked like it had been bleached. There was a metallic mylar blanket folded up neatly in the middle with a ration pack sitting on top.

The label said the ration was spiced veg-meat and gravy. 

For some reason that was important, but he was too tired to work out why.

The bunk they had slept in together was empty.

At the far end of the row, on the opposite side to the clean bunk with the ration pack, Hux had taped another blanket over the alcove opening to form a curtain. The tip of Millicent’s orange tail was just visible swishing slowly under the bottom edge of the fabric.

Well, if that wasn’t a clear message, Dopheld would eat his hat. What was left of it anyway.

In the refresher Hux had scratched into the wall above the head the message ‘leave lid up for cat’. He almost laughed at the mental image of Millicent trying to lift the seat with her paws so he did as he was asked. 

Another message over the sink informed him that the water from the right hand tap was safe to drink and the left was only for washing. 

Had Hux decided to use notes for convenience, or was he intending never to speak to Dopheld again? 

That was a hell of a conclusion to jump to, wasn’t it? Surely the sensible reason was that Hux was asleep and didn’t want Dopheld to either poison himself with grey water, or cause the cat to piss on the deck.

Still, they hadn’t really made peace, had they?

Dopheld couldn’t say how he felt about anything right now. 

He’d had something of a quiet breakdown in the cockpit thinking of all the people he’d never see again, even though as a deserter he wouldn’t have seen them anyway, and everyone dies in the end, and he hadn’t really like many of them, and they’d be working towards what seemed to have been a terrible goal, and if he’d stayed he would be dead now too, and so would Hux, and and and

Pain blossomed up his left arm as he punched the wall in front of him.

He hadn’t intended to do that. He wasn’t the sort of Alpha that lashed out when things weren’t going his way, he never had been, but stars he’d been spiralling into this for hours and he needed to do something to calm the fuck down.

Something tapped quietly on the refresher door.

“Are you alright?” Hux asked when Dopheld didn’t respond.

His knuckles were bleeding.

“No. Are you?”

“No.”

Dopheld sighed and opened the door.

Hux was haggard, his eye sockets looking bruised and his gaze mostly empty. The messy state of his hair showed he’d been laying down, but he didn’t seem to have slept. 

Without speaking, Hux carefully raised Dopheld’s hand to see it better under the dim lights of the sleep cycle. The bleeding was already slowing, so it left sticky smears on Hux’s fingers as he tested each bone in turn. Apparently satisfied, he pressed a kiss to Dopheld’s knuckles, then turned away.

He was back behind the curtain of his bunk before Dopheld got his thoughts in order enough to open his mouth. There wasn’t anything he could say.

Dopheld went to the clean bunk and laid down.

Hours later, when the two men finally began to snore, Millicent folded herself into a loaf shape on an empty bunk, and stared up at an empty space six feet above the floor.


	3. Chapter 3

The morning passed mostly in silence.

Dopheld had woken to find Hux in the cockpit, speaking in passable Twi’leki to a nearby ship who were able to confirm the local standard time. Apparently there was already some debate going on about which galactic standard should be adopted, so local time was the best they were going to get. 

Before he could even say ‘hello’, Hux had handed him a nutrient bar, pointed to a datapad with a list of tasks—some of which were initialled AH—and then he’d disappeared off towards the cargo hold. 

According to the list Hux intended to work on the stabilisers which Dopheld certainly wouldn’t have even recognised so there was not much chance of him helping there. 

After browsing the list for a minute or two, chewing slowly on his nutrients in the hope that he could fool his body into feeling satisfied, Dopheld chose the task ‘clean the kitchenette’. Unlike the fiddly rewiring this felt like a job that might help him burn off some energy. 

He’d hardly slept thanks to some horrible nightmares. 

People he’d worked alongside for years had reached for his hand as the deck gave way underneath them, but he couldn’t reach them. Officers would be addressing him in one moment and obliterated by fire in the next. He found himself standing at the viewports all over again, watching the severed wing of the Supremacy drifting in space as thousands of comrades suffocated. Whole planets crumbled under his bare hands. Every death was his fault.

When he woke he was drenched in sweat and his heart was hammering fit to burst.

Given all that he should have been exhausted. 

Instead he felt oddly wired, as if he needed to head out on a twenty click run around the maintenance corridors until his head was clearer. Unfortunately the Orange Feline didn’t have kilometres of corridor in which to run. Technically it didn’t have any corridors at all.

Hmm. It would probably be a good idea to check with Hux before he officially named the ship—Hux had paid for it after all. 

“Come on, Dopheld, get back to the task at hand,” he muttered quietly to himself. His concentration was awful this morning. 

He found he kitchenette in the cargo hold, diagonally opposite to the refresher. There had been actual plant life growing in there once—it looked like someone had tried to terraform the countertops. 

If Dopheld wanted to burn some energy, this would be the way to do it.

* * *

Something had been using the upper cabinets as a food storage area. In this case ‘food’ mostly meant half eaten carcasses. 

The heat of the Jakku desert, and the various tiny scavengers that lived amongst the san,d had stripped most of the soft tissue from the bones, but there was still a quite horrifying quantity of dead things to pull out of there. 

As if this long deceased creature wanted to spite him further, it had also built a whole damn nest in one of the lower cabinets, complete with all the waste baby animals tended to leave behind.

Dopheld had managed to go thirty two years without encountering any kind of animal and now it seemed like he was surrounded by evidence of them. At least Millicent was trained to use the facilities like a civilised being. 

After an hour of gruesome work, once he had the larger waste items bagged up in the nearest airlock, Dopheld turned to the task of bleaching and scrubbing all the surfaces. He was good at this. 

Unlike the other human occupant of the ship he’d never been forced to clean the floors of the academy with a toothbrush. Because his sergeant at the time suspected he would enjoy it, and had forced him to do pull-ups until he collapsed instead. But if he had been made to do it those floors would have looked incredible.

There was something very relaxing about cleaning. It was simple, and the goal was clear—remove the dirt from the thing, then repeat with another thing. He didn’t need to think about much, he could just watch the filth get washed away.

By mid-afternoon his mind was blissfully blank and he had the kitchenette mostly under control. Mostly.

Some of the mushrooms growing in the crevices between the counter and the wall tried to fight back, but what the vacuum of space couldn’t kill fire certainly would. 

Hux didn’t really appreciate him borrowing his welding torch for such an ignoble task, though since the Omega used the interruption as an excuse to stretch his legs he didn’t swear at him too much over it. 

They really needed to get more clothes the next time they stopped for supplies. 

Between them both they only had two full outfits, plus their undergarments. Dopheld’s clothes had been a gift from Hux that he didn’t want to ruin with dirty water, so he’d opted to wear just his undershirt and shorts.

Usually Hux kept covered, however it seemed that working on the stabilisers was hotter than the atmospherics on the rest of the ship would suggest, because Hux was soaked in sweat and had stripped down to his leggings. Dopheld was trying to be polite by ignoring those details, but the moisture kept glittering in a way that caught his eye, which in turn drew his attention to the new scars littering Hux’s body.

The faded marks around his left shoulder had been there since early childhood, and Dopheld knew their shape well, but the lines across his back were new. Some of them seemed to extend to his upper arms, or vanish under the waistband of his leggings. If he didn’t know better he would have guessed that Hux had been whipped. The wide marks around his wrists and ankles suggested something only slightly less sinister, but more in keeping with what he knew of Hux as a person. 

It wasn’t his business what Hux had got up to since their relationship ended, but Dopheld had obliged with the ropes himself once or twice when Hux had found his mind running away with him. Apparently whoever he’d been with last had helped him indulge much more regularly.

‘Whoever’. 

Dopheld had thought that he’d guessed who Hux had been having a relationship with, but the mention of a ‘Ben’ has raised questions he wasn’t sure he wanted to ask.

He shivered suddenly when Hux created a draft by closing a door at the other end of the cargo hold. If he didn’t keep moving around it soon became far too cold to sit around in his underwear. How Hux was still sweating he didn’t know. 

Shaking his head Dopheld tried to clear the curiosity from his mind so he could focus on the task in front of him. 

The sooner he was done, the sooner he could put his clothes back on.

* * *

“I think some of these rations might be off,” Hux said, interrupting the silence for the first time in hours. He was sitting on the floor with his back against a bulkhead, glaring at the sachet in his hand.

“Why, what’s wrong with it?”

“Tastes odd.”

Dopheld peered over at the label from where he was occupied in polishing the last few feet of the kitchenette counter. 

“That’s carbohydrate slurry #13,” he said, “it’s  _ always  _ tasted odd.”

“Odder than usual though,” Hux insisted. Pulling himself awkward up by one of the pipes protruding from the wall Hux limped over and held out the rations. “Here, try it.”

“I’d rather not.”

“You’ve always had a better sense of taste than me,” Hux said.

“No, you murdered your tastebuds with caf and cigarras when you were a teen.”

“Same difference.”

Clearly Hux wasn’t going to give up on this. Dopheld took the proffered sachet.

The first mouthful did taste strange, though it took him a minute or two to place since few natural treats ever made their way onto First Order ships. The flavour reminded him of the honey cakes that had been brought onboard the Finalizer after a successful early trade negotiation. That had been ten years ago but the taste had stayed with him.

Regrettably the second mouthful tasted exactly like carb slurry #13.

“Huh,” he said. He looked at the packaging. It looked normal. “Maybe something got onto the outside of the sipping tube and that’s why it tastes wrong?”

Hux squeezed a glob of the horrible grey stuff onto his finger and licked it. “Still tastes odd. Here, you try.”

If Dopheld were differently inclined the sight of Hux, sweaty and topless, asking him to lick his fingers would have a very different effect on him. Then again, no one actually liked carb slurry #13, so maybe not.

Trying not to roll his eyes Dopheld leaned forward slightly and licked the finger Hux was offering.

The honey flavour was much more pronounced this time. 

“It’s you,” he said with a laugh. “ _ You  _ taste odd. If you wash up the strange taste will probably go away.”

With a look of disgust Hux threw the rest of the sachet into the garbage bin by Dopheld’s feet and turned towards the refresher.

“I think we need to find a trading post. One that sells soap.”

* * *

The spaceport they found the next day was in full carnival mode. 

The air was full of the scents of fresh cakes and frying meat, music poured from every open doorway, and chains of tiny flags crisscrossed the ceiling until it felt like walking under a canopy of colourful leaves. 

Dopheld wouldn’t even have noticed that half of the flags were torn up First Order banners if ‘Max’ hadn’t pointed it out to him. 

Since Hux didn’t like to let anyone use  _ any _ form of his first name they’d settled on another xesh sound for his new alias. Max and Hux were close enough in Dopheld’s accent that if he said the wrong one by mistake there was a chance that no one would notice. 

Hux would continue to use Pheld since most people would assume it was spelled with a forn instead of peth herf so there was no risk of anyone identifying him. Not that it really mattered—no one outside of his own deployments would have heard of Lieutenant Dopheld Mitaka. Unlike Hux, he hadn’t been the public face of the destruction of five planets.

In the days since their escape Hux had grown an impressive layer of stubble. They’d darkened the fuzz with grease in the hope that coupled with covering his hair it would be enough to hide his identity. 

So far no one had looked at him, though a few had leered at Dopheld as they passed by. 

Perhaps it was the staff Hux had made for himself from scraps of plumbing pipe. It was nearly as tall as Hux, and though it was clear he was using it for support there was something in the way he moved it while stationary that suggested he had other uses for it.

Polearm fighting wasn’t common for officers, but maybe Hux had taken extra lessons.

As they moved deeper into the marketplace it became increasingly tempting to go wild with their spending. In the festive atmosphere everything smelled delicious, and the colours of the clothes were brighter than anything you ever saw in public amongst the First Order. 

Sadly indulgence wouldn’t be wise because wealth draws attention.

Although they still had more money than Dopheld could imagine, there was no telling how long that would last. If they got themselves robbed it would last no time at all.

Clothes, cleaning supplies, food. They didn’t need anything else.

Quite quickly Dopheld found himself drawn to a stall selling pre-made clothing for humans, and other species of the same general shape. A set of robes in soft gold and copper tones had caught his eye as the perfect choice for Hux.

“Ah, pretty little Omega, come here, come here,” the merchant laughed, beckoning with fingers that were stacked with rings. “You shouldn’t be wearing that with those eyes, you should be wearing silver and all the colours of a bountiful river.”

Dopheld looked behind him but Hux had limped over to a booth selling toiletries and other grooming products.

“No, don’t look behind you child, your Alpha deserves a surprise, come, look at the finery I can wrap you in—“

Unsettled by this strange speech, Dopheld hurried away further down the aisle. 

There were dozens if not hundreds of merchants here, he didn’t have to tolerate that kind of behaviour just to get what he wanted. 

Another merchant had a similar set of robes on display as the first had done, but for a more reasonable price. The fabric was soft and flowing, probably not a practical garment but it would be perfect for relaxing in. 

Dopheld wasn’t sure why but he liked the image of Hux curling up somewhere comfortable with a datapad and a cup of tarine tea. Thinking about it made his chest feel warm.

This merchant wasn’t human, and didn’t seem to care about anyone’s designation, but he gave Dopheld a good deal on six other sets of generic clothes that would probably fit them both, and a pair of thick fluffy blankets.

He was tired of listening to the mylar fabric rustling when he was trying to sleep.

Again the image of bundling up all warm and cosy with Hux flooded his mind. He blushed a little when he realised he was picturing himself in the scenario this time too. It’d be nice to feel Hux leaning back against his chest while they read together, like it had been all those years again.

For a moment Dopheld could have sworn that he caught a hint of Kylo Ren’s scent.

“Hi, Pheld, how’s it going?” 

Suddenly Hux was on his right, linking his free arm through Dopheld’s while he pressed a kiss to his cheek. 

“We shouldn’t linger,” he whispered in a vaguely disturbing attempt at a Correlian accent. He didn’t elaborate. 

Hux had a bag slung across his back. It sounded like bottles were clinking together every time he put his weight on his injured leg. 

“Did you get the cleaning things?” Dopheld asked. He was scanning the marketplace for other items they might need while also trying to subtly spot what exactly had unsettled Hux. Had he smelled Ren or was he just imagining things?

“Yes, for us and for the ship.” Hux said, his tone lgiht and casual. “I also found some patch repair kits for the bunks. I’d rather not live somewhere that looks like the mice are still feasting on it.”

Dopheld began to chuckle but the sound died in his throat as they turned a corner. 

Someone had built an archway above the aisle here and decorated it with more banners. It would have looked rather festive if they hadn’t chosen stormtrooper armour as their material of choice.

There were scorch marks, and stains. Most of the stains had faded to brown, but some of the blood still had a hint of red to it.

Almost everyone he’d ever known was dead.

He almost jumped when Hux pulled him in for a kiss.

Dopheld’s first thought was to push him away for the wildly inappropriate act. The second was that Hux tasted like warm honey. The third was that Hux was muttering under his breath.

“Calm down, you can’t look upset.”

Of course. 

At least the passersby would think his blush was from the public display of affection rather than almost getting them caught.

“Aaawwww come on baby, drop the zero, get with the hero…” crowwed a voice from nearby.

The owner of the voice looked like he might have been a bounty hunter twenty years earlier, but had given up that career to spend more time focusing on his dream of becoming the galaxy’s most repellant man. The musk of stale Alpha and spice sweat around his display of poorly cared for weapons only strengthened that impression.

Hux rolled his eyes and moved away towards a merchant who was selling dried food stuffs that had clearly been packaged with small spaceships in mind.

“Yeah, that’s right,” the repellant man continued, leering into Dopheld’s personal space. “That guy ain’t worthy o—” he sniffed. “Huh. You’re an Alpha.”

If Dopheld were a different person, probably one with a death wish, he would have tried to give a witty reply. But he wasn’t stupid so he just shrugged.

“Sorry, must be the vents,” he offered, pointing to the atmospheric pipes running overhead. “Confuses the nose sometimes.”

The man seemed too caught up in dramatically wiping his face to respond. Apparently accidentally scenting an Alpha was the most embarrassing thing that could possibly have happened to him. 

Three other humans were watching Hux. 

Dopheld hadn’t noticed them until now. 

Perhaps the man’s strange behaviour had triggered some kind of instinct because he was suddenly intensely aware of his surroundings, and he felt almost as if all the hair on his body was standing on end. 

Why was that? 

This was distinct from his normal fear reaction.

He sniffed the air, trying to work out whether he could smell Ren, or any of his Knights. He had no idea what designation the Knights were—their armour disguised all of that—but they and their ship had a very distinctive stench.

All he could smell right now was sweet cakes baking somewhere nearby.

Walking towards Hux he realised he was also carrying his shoulders wider than he usually would—as a low level officer he was used to making himself look small and deferential.

The other humans weren’t actually  _ looking  _ at Hux, they had their mouths slightly open as they turned their heads, which meant they were also scenting something in Hux’s direction.

One of them locked eyes with Dopheld when he finally drew level with Hux. 

Without thinking Dopheld put his hand on the nape of his Omega’s neck.

He might as well have shouted a challenge at them because suddenly all their eyes were laser-focused on him.

Oh no, even more humans in the crowd had turned to look at them now as well.

“Thank you, keep the change,” Hux said in his odd accent. He practically snatched the bag from the merchant and awkwardly wrapped his arm around Dopheld’s waist. “Come on, darling, we need to get home.”

Dopheld still wasn’t entirely clear about what was going on, but with his arm now slung around Hux’s shoulders he took the hint and let Hux guide them quickly back towards the ship. 

He wasn’t sure if the others were following or not, but somehow he knew that turning around to check would be a bad idea. Instead, he kept his focus forward, just in case any new threats appeared.

Apparently Hux had decided to take a more direct route—rather than retracing their steps—which required them to walk directly under the grisly archway. Dopheld wondered how many of those stormtroopers were still alive, and whether he’d ever met any of them. 

They were a few dozen paces down the aisle when there was a shout, followed by a terrible clattering noise. 

Somehow the arch had collapsed. 

Glancing back Dopheld saw one of the humans who had been watching them struggling to get out of the debris.

Ah, so they  _ had _ been following them.

Tightening his grip Hux turned them around a corner and quickened his pace the small amount his leg would allow.

“Max? What’s going on?” Dopheld tried.

Hux shook his head, his lips pressed so tightly together they were white from the stress.

* * *

They made it back to the ship without further incident, though Dopheld did notice a few more heads turn curiously to follow them. Fortunately, they’d left the Orange Feline in a corner of the spaceport that looked to be popular with other species and that seemed to help. 

Whatever was going on—only other humans had been paying any attention to them.

If they’d been recognised someone would have shouted, or taken a potshot at the them, Dopheld felt sure of that. If the spaceport crew had been willing to display the remains of stormtroopers they’d definitely approve of killing officers. 

So if no one cared that they had been First Order, then why were they being followed?

Dopheld didn’t get the chance to ask Hux that question, because he had flung himself into the pilot’s seat before the cargo hatch had even finished closing. 

The traffic around the spaceport was pretty thin, making departure easy, which meant Dopheld was only just climbing into the cockpit when they left atmosphere.

Two short hyperspace jumps, seemingly at random, and then Hux was out of his seat again.

“What’s wron—”

The refresher door slammed behind Hux.

“-g?” Dopheld finished asking the now empty room. 

Millicent gave a sympathetic chirrup from her place on Hux’s bunk, but it didn’t answer any of Dopheld’s questions.

* * *

Hux was still in the refresher when the lights dimmed for the night cycle. Every so often Dopheld would hear the water running in there, but not much else. 

He had tried asking if Hux needed help but all he got were single syllable replies. 

At least Hux had told him they were in no immediate danger.

Dopheld still didn’t know what had happened, but he had the feeling that he _ should _ know, and that was getting to him. 

There was an itch at the back of his brain, like remembering something from an academy lecture he hadn’t been listening to that would suddenly become important ten years later.

He laid in his bunk, staring at the little light above his head and tried to focus. That was harder than it should have been too.

The feeling of being oddly energised was still lingering in his system, even after their sudden departure from the market. He wanted to run around, or get something productive done. He knew he should be sleeping since he’d barely slept over the last two nights—in that same vein it probably wasn’t a good idea to do anything complex. The last thing they needed was for him to break something because he was too tired to concentrate.

Well, he’d cleaned the kitchen, why not the rest of the ship?

Mind made up, Dopheld climbed back out of bed and went in search of the new cleaning supplies Hux had bought.

As he scrubbed the decks in the cargo hold it completely slipped his mind to wonder what had happened in the spaceport. 

* * *

Some time in the early hours of the morning Millicent took matters into her own paws when she began scratching determinedly at the refresher door. When this didn’t produce immediate results she added wailing to the strategy.

Dopheld was waist deep in a storage compartment, clearing dust and detritus from the corners, when Hux answered the cat’s calls and finally vacated the room. 

He didn’t seem to notice Dopheld where he was kneeling, though he did peer towards Dopheld’s bunk before he crept towards his own alcove. 

Since they hadn’t unpacked together Hux hadn’t seen the new clothes and blankets, which mistook the pile of fabric in Dopheld’s bed for a sleeping body that he seemed to be at pains not to wake. 

Very strange behaviour, Dopheld thought to himself as he continued to clean. 

There was some rustling as Hux retreated behind the curtain covering his alcove; the quiet pad of Millicent returning from the refresher; and then silence once more. 

After a few moments Dopheld realised he needed the head himself. 

Climbing out of the storage compartment was a little like stepping into one of the saunas that had been built into the ‘officers’ retreat’ on the Supremacy. It had only been open to the lower ranks for a few hours a month but that had just made the experience more memorable.

He was walking into a warm, humid haze. Part of his brain tried to worry about the atmospheric settings, or a leak in a steam valve, but he felt too… not relaxed… contented… yes, that was the word, he felt too content to worry about that kind of thing.

There was an odd scent in the air too. 

Hadn’t he smelled something like this before?

Hmmmm. Did it matter?

It was only when he was washing his hands in the sink that he realised that the air in the refresher was thick with the sweet smell of honey cakes, with a sharp edge that he’d always thought of as Hux’s own particular scent.

Oh.

Dopheld met his own gaze in the mirror. His irises were blown so wide there was hardly any colour around them.

“You absolute moron,” he said, trying to glare at himself, fully aware that he just looked ridiculous. He tried splashing cold water over his face, which did help wake him up a little.

He had a very strong suspicion about what was going on now, but he really should ask Hux, because this wasn’t a good conclusion to jump to without more information.

The living quarters were silent but for the soft sounds of Millie purring and Hux breathing deeply.

If Hux was sleeping Dopheld really shouldn’t wake him up just to ask him a question—if he was wrong he would be disturbing his sleep for no reason, and if he was right, well, Hux probably needed all the rest he could get.

“I swear I can hear you overthinking out there, Pheld,” Hux said at barely more than a murmur. 

“Are you in heat?” Dopheld blurted, and instantly hated himself for it.

The curtain covering Hux’s alcove twitched back just enough for Hux to give him a dead eyed look. Instantly that same cloud of honey sweet scent filled the room again. Dopheld felt so stupid for not recognising it as the same flavour that had been on Hux’s fingers two days before.

“Evidently, yes.”

“Oh, uh…”

“It’s three weeks early.”

“Ah.”

“That’s why I didn’t realise.”

“Oh.”

The curtain closed again.

Well. That had gone terribly, hadn’t it?

In Dopheld’s defence, he’d never actually been around an Omega in full heat before. 

As far as he understood it the First Order would have torn itself apart years ago if Alphas and Omegas were allowed to just wander around riling each other up with scents. Omegas stayed on suppressants until they were ready to commit to a Mate and the very rare Alpha that went into rut on their own got thrown into medical for a week. The First Order needed children so most Mated Omegas ran off to their quarters as soon as the first hint of a heat started. 

Living as he had in the unmated barracks he’d only caught the occasional whiff of someone in passing, never anything more. He’d certainly never been locked in a tiny spacecraft with an Omega before. His subconscious changed that to His Omega, and the rest of his mind was disgusted with himself.

Hux didn’t need him mooning around out here while he was going through something like this. He’d just be making him uncomfortable. 

“Can I help at all? Do you need me to do anything?” He asked. Of course, if what Hux had said was true then he had been off his suppressants for years. If he needed something he would ask for it, wouldn’t he?

There was a sound that might have been Hux snorting, or perhaps he was just getting comfortable. “No, I don’t need you to  _ do  _ anything, don’t worry.”

Oh. There had been an innuendo there where Dopheld hadn’t intended to put one. He flushed hotly and stared down at his hands in embarrassment. “I… I  _ can _ do that, if you want me to, I could—”

“No, Pheld, thank you.” Hux sighed. “I’m just going to… stay in here… for a while. Though if you’d leave me water here whenever you get your own, that would certainly make this easier.” He pointed to the floor beside the alcove when a water bottle already sat.

“Okay. What about food?”

“I’d rather not right now. I can find my own rations if I need to.”

“Okay.”

When Hux didn’t offer anything else, Dopheld went to his own bunk and tried to lay down again, but he still couldn’t sleep.

He was being affected by Hux’s scent, though not in the stereotypical way that Alphas were  _ supposed _ to respond the Omegas in heat. 

He felt weird for feeling weird about that. There had always been the implication that heat scent would transform any Alpha into a beast, and even after more than a decade of self acceptance it still felt odd to fall outside those expectations.

Hux had smelled  _ so _ attractive that half a dozen random Alphas had tried to follow them without even knowing which was the Omega. 

People had noticed Hux from across the room and been mesmerized by him. Dopheld had… done some cleaning.

Well, maybe that wasn’t entirely fair. 

He’d bought things for Hux, luxuries they didn’t really need like the thicker blankets he was currently laying on—he’d chosen them because he’d been daydreaming about curling up with him. 

And he had defended him in the market. Not intentionally but he had. He’d basically challenged those other Alphas, even if it hadn’t come to anything in the end. 

Dopheld closed his eyes and focused on the idea of Hux. Instantly his mind was filled with images of Hux laughing about happier times; how his teeth touched his lower lip when he said ‘Pheld’; long eyelashes fluttering in his sleep; the face he made when a plan came together; the press of his lips against Dopheld’s knuckles; the way he gestured with his rations as he spoke earnestly about something.

Those things were all perfect, and not at all what he was ‘supposed’ to be thinking about. He wasn’t trying to think about affection.

They’d never had sex, so Dopheld tried to remember the many times when they’d shared a bed and Hux had worked through his own desires with a toy, or just his hands. The flush of his cheeks; the glitter of his grin; the sigh as he relaxed into Dopheld’s arms afterwards.

Seeing Hux happy was a wonderful thing, it made his chest warm and his heart rate increase but… 

Based on everything he’d ever heard from other Alphas he should be going mad with need right now. Knotting Hux should be his number one priority to the neglect of everything else in his life. He should be a slathering beast, the sort of reckless fool that would try to follow a stranger back from the market just because they smelled nice. What was that line from that bodice-ripper he’d read once? ‘There could be no greater aim than to spill his seed in a willing Omega’.

No. That really wasn’t doing anything for him. 

It wasn’t that he had never had sex—he’d tried it twice as a younger man, along with some rather dull experiments into masturbation—but the presence of an Omega in heat hadn’t driven him to a blinding need for it.

In a way it was something of a relief to know that chemicals wouldn't override his core personality. If he did end up having sex with Hux it would be because he’d chosen to, not because he was compelled to do it. 

Of course, that would first require Hux to choose him, and he had always insisted that he wouldn’t ask that of him. 

Dopheld sighed and rolled out of bed again. He really shouldn’t let himself get into his own head.

Perhaps Hux would appreciate a bottle of water.

He could do that at least.

* * *

Dopheld rarely saw Hux over the next few days. More than once he heard telltale moist sounds from the space behind the curtain, or the occasional moan from the shower. He glimpsed his figure sometimes, crossing to the refresher or the kitchenette and back, but he seemed to do his best to avoid crossing Dopheld’s path.

He had to admit that after the third day the isolation started to hurt. 

They’d known each other for so long, and they’d been through so much—including years in a relationship—that Hux’s sudden discomfort in his presence was disheartening to say the least.

Part of him would always think of Hux as His Omega, so it was hard not to be allowed to function as  _ his _ Alpha, even in a chaste capacity.

He wanted to catch Hux during one of his brief journeys and remind him that he didn’t have to do this alone. He wanted to curl up beside him in his bunk, hold him close, rub his back, feed him bites of food so he wouldn’t be quite so exhausted.

How long did these things usually go on if there wasn’t an Alpha around? Five days? Or seven? He couldn’t remember what they’d said in the health classes he’d barely been awake for as a teen.

Would it just burn out on its own if he didn’t have a Mate or Alpha to sleep with?

Technically there  _ was  _ an Alpha around. Would that make a difference? Could Hux smell Dopheld the same way he could smell Hux? Was he making Hux feel worse just by existing?

There was no point focusing on all these questions he couldn’t answer.

If Hux wanted help, he would ask for it. He’d said so himself. 

All Dopheld could do was keep out of the way, and keep busy. 

Between the nightmares and restless energy, he found that getting to sleep was still an issue. However, the ship was a long way from perfect so there was always more work to be done.

Once every surface he could reach was clean he turned his hands to other tasks: he repaired the mattresses in the other alcoves; oiled every moving joint he could find; refurbished all the dials in the cockpit; and finally—he found the flight manual.

With every day that passed he found that he reacted the scent in the air less. Whether that was because the intensity was fading or because he was building an immunity he didn’t know. 

His mind was clearer, he could concentrate for longer, now it was time to be useful.

Hux was the only one who could confidently pilot the ship, and until they got him some suppressants he’d be incapacitated every few months. If Dopheld could learn even the basics of flight that would take some of the pressure off.

* * *

He was so glad he was alone for this.

The best way to learn was to do, but without a competent pilot to supervise him the next best thing was to mime all the movements until they became muscle memory. 

Unfortunately, the process made him look like a complete idiot.

He’d been working his way through the take off manoeuvre for what seemed like hours when he felt someone’s eyes on him.

Lifting his hands from the controls Dopheld turned to look behind him, expecting to see Hux standing in the doorway. 

No one was there.

He returned to the task but the sensation didn’t change.

“Mip!”

This time, when he turned around, he looked down.

Millicent was staring at him.

“Hello, Magnificent.”

“Prrp!” She fluffed her tail and placed her front paws on Dopheld’s leg.

He reached to pat her head but she immediately twisted her face to look up and behind her.

“What’s so exciting about the ceiling, huh?” He asked. 

Just as usual Millicent didn’t answer. After several seconds of communing with whatever invisible conspirator she was hallucinating, she wailed and headed back into the living quarters. Apparently it was time to play another game of follow the cat.

Dopheld stood and stretched, his gaze turning idly towards the door.

There was a hand hanging out of Hux’s alcove, slim wrist visible under the edge of the curtain.

“Hux?”

He’d run across the deck and torn the fabric out of the way before he’d even finished calling his name.

“Hmmmm?” Hux murmured lethargically, his eyes closed and his jaw hanging slack. He looked terrible, his skin papery dry and pale to the point of being almost translucent. It was clear from the mess of his hair that he had been sweating a lot, but he clearly wasn’t anymore.

“Hux?” Dopheld touched his arm then snatched his hand back in surprise. 

He had never felt human skin get that hot before. 

In case he was mistaken he tried again, holding the back of his hand to Hux’s forehead, but the results were the same.

Ignoring Hux’s naked state, and his apparent inability to respond, Dopheld caught him up in his arms to take him to the shower. He had to do something to cool him down.

They were half way across the cargo hold when Dopheld remembered how hard it had been to drag Hux down that corridor only a couple of weeks before. How was he carrying him so easily now?

When had Hux last eaten? He didn’t know because he hadn’t been keeping track of how often Hux staggered to the kitchenette.

He’d seen him in there yesterday hadn’t he? Or the day before?

Wait, how long had he been in heat?

There were tally marks on the back wall of Hux’s alcove. 

Seven. But he’d complained about the strange taste two days before that. 

How had Hux been in heat for nine days? How had Dopheld let that happen without checking on him?


	4. Chapter 4

“Pheld? Why are we sitting in the shower?” Hux murmured, barely audible under the noise of the spray.

A laugh still escaped despite the hand Dopheld had tried to slap over his own mouth. It was a sound of relief tinged with incredulity. He’d been sitting here with Hux for at least an hour now, trying to get his temperature down to a safe level, but Hux made it sound like he was pulling some kind of prank. That had to be a sign that he was feeling better.

“You’ve been in heat for nine days,” he said once he had himself under control again. “Do you remember? You were barely responsive when I found you, and so hot that I thought you’d die.”

Hux snorted. Water scattered away from his face briefly before the stream returned to normal. He scrubbed a hand over his face as if he’d only just become aware of the damp. 

“Oh, now he finds me hot.” Hux said quietly behind his palm as he futilely tried to wipe water out of his maturing beard. 

Dopheld didn’t bother to dignify the complaint with a response. That wasn’t what he had meant and Hux knew that. 

Frankly, now that the first flush of relief had passed, he was too worried and uncomfortable to be having an argument.

They had been lucky to get a ship that had a filtered water decontamination shower rather than the usual sonic. Dopheld had no idea how he would have cooled Hux down without access to continuous cold water. 

Still, he let himself seeth a little at Hux’s attitude. Dopheld had spent all this time, fully clothed and shivering, pouring rehydration solution down the throat of his highly aroused and very unwell ex-partner. It had not been a pleasant situation. He would have liked to have received a ‘thank you’.

“Well,” Hux said instead, “clearly I’m better now. So, if you just let me up, we can—“

“Hux, please, stay down before you fall down. I don’t know when you last ate, but I’d be amazed if you had the power to stand on your own.” Dopheld continued with slightly more steel to his tone than he had intended. “ _ Also _ , you’re clearly not fine yet.”

He waved the hand still holding the latest bottle of drinking water towards Hux’s lap, where the evidence of his continued heat was standing proud. 

Hux glanced down, apparently surprised to find that he was still hard, then shut his eyes in frustration. He drew in a deep breath that turned into a shaky sigh.

“Fuck,” he muttered.

Keeping his eyes closed, Hux pushed himself away from where he’d been leaning against Dopheld’s side and shuffled around until he was sitting with his back against the opposite wall. He pulled his knees up against his chest, possibility hoping to hide his erection, but the shimmer of slick coating his thighs still gave him away.

It wasn’t that Dopheld was trying to look at Hux—at least no more than was necessary to keep an eye on his health—but the shower was only a few feet square. There weren’t exactly that many other options.

He should still try to be conscientious of Hux’s discomfort though—just because Dopheld didn’t especially care about Hux’s aroused state, that didn’t mean the feeling was mutual. 

In the end, he settled on the old staple for lower ranks talking to officers, and fixed his gaze on Hux’s left ear.

“I—” Hux coughed, the sound still horribly dry despite all the water he’d consumed, and pressed a hand to his side with a look of discomfort. “I guess I’m a little surprised that you didn’t just fuck me out of it.”

“You weren’t conscious to consent,” Dopheld replied immediately. He could feel himself blushing despite the cold because he  _ had _ thought of that. When nothing changed after the first thirty minutes he had started to worry that he’d need to attempt some kind of manual help if Hux didn’t improve. The idea had made him very uncomfortable.

Hux blinked. “But you’re an Alpha.”

“I might be an Alpha,” he snapped, “but I’m not a monster.”

The empty look Hux gave him made bile rise in his throat. 

Their eyes locked, the discomfort intensifying until Dopheld almost wanted to run from the room, before Hux finally looked away. 

“Sorry,” Hux muttered, “I  _ know _ you’re not like other Alphas.”

A tense silence grew, both of them seeming to fall into their own inner worlds. Whatever experiences Hux had had with Alphas, there was nothing Dopheld could do about it. All those Alphas were probably dead by now. He wasn’t usually an aggressive person, but in that moment he’d have ripped Ren’s throat out with his bare teeth if he got the chance.

“How long do your heats usually last?” Dopheld asked. 

He knew he was mostly asking as a desperate attempt to move his mind back to reality, but if they were going to continue living together then he should probably know.

Hux kept his eyes on the tiles beside him when he replied. “They were three or four days long, when I was still single and dealing with them on my own.”

“Ren?”

“There was someone else before him.”

Dopheld raised an eyebrow, and waited for Hux to go on.

“You probably think I’m a hypocrite, leaving you because I was afraid of Ren lashing out, only to find someone else, but—” Hux sighed. “No, I was a hypocrite. At first he was so very quiet that I didn’t even realise I was falling for him. Then I tried to tell myself that he didn’t matter. By the time I accepted that he  _ did  _ matter, I was too late.”

“Is this Ben?” Dopheld asked, already knowing the answer. Hux had the same look on his face as he’d had when he when he first introduced Millicent.

Hux nodded sadly. “Yes. We met in the upper-rank gym. As soon as I saw him I knew he was a pilot—no helmet wearer but a flyboy could ever get away with hair like that. He kept it long, and he carried himself in that way they have—like they own the whole damn galaxy because they can fly fast. But as soon as he opened his mouth, I realised he wasn’t as arrogant as he looked. Shy really. It took two weeks for him to actually attempt a full conversation. He saw me working on amendments to Kuat ship designs while I was on a treadmill and he shared some information about X-wings. It was another month before he dared to touch my hand. I fell for him hard.”

“Where is he now?”

“I lost him on the Supremacy.”

“I’m so sorry.” Dopheld said, and was a little surprised to realise he meant the words very sincerely. He couldn’t find it in his heart to be angry at this pseudo-rival who’d been dead for a year now. Hux hadn’t been his at the time, and it seemed like this Alpha had made him happy for a while. 

At least he’d given Hux Millicent to keep him safe.

“It was my fault. I should have seen it coming.” Hux was staring at the floor, his shoulders drawn up like he expected a blow. “I think I lost my mind after that. It turned out that Ren’s helmet kept him from smelling me, and vice versa. When the dust settled, and he had all that power—I went to him willingly. With Ben my heats would either be over in a day if he was around, or they’d drag on for a week. With Ren I never knew because he kept me too busy to track time. My last heat five weeks ago was intense, I didn’t expect—“

Another rib-creaking fit of coughing cut Hux off mid-word.

“You didn’t expect another so soon?” Dopheld finished the sentence for him as he handed over the bottle of water.

Hux was too busy drinking to reply.

“Fuck, I feel like my throat is made from mince and broken glass,” he said once the bottle was empty.

Dopheld laughed. “I remember eating that in the officer’s mess on the last primeday of the month.”

At least that made Hux smile for a second before he tipped his head back against the tiles and groaned. “I can’t believe this has dragged on for nine damn days. I didn’t bring anything with me to get through this. Your self control must be made from diamond, Pheld.”

“Hmm?” Dopheld made a questioning noise while he shifted, trying to find a comfortable position in his soaking wet clothes. Now that Hux’s fever-hot form wasn’t pressed against his side he was getting colder by the second, but he couldn’t possibly leave Hux alone in his condition. If he passed out again he’d probably drown.

“I thought all Alphas and Omegas were affected the same way by mating scents, but you’re cool as a glacier.”

“I was affected, but it felt more like taking too many stimulants than anything else.” Dopheld said, “I had so much extra energy that I managed to be very productive while you were out of action.”

Hux had been peered at him through the spray the whole time he was changing position. It felt oddly like being studied under a microscope.

“I wish I’d been ‘very productive’.” Hux said. “I feel like I’ve barely come at all the last few days. But, yes, I can see from your irises that you can smell me just as much as I can smell you. And yet, you don’t feel any…” He waved a hand towards Dopheld’s crotch, a gesture that made them both blush.

In Hux’s case the blush stayed like a stain on his skin. Dopheld wondered if the topic of conversation was getting him worked up again or if he’d been getting there on his own.

“No.” 

Dopheld paused, unsure whether it was wise to take this dive. Hux was more lucid than he had been but he was clearly still in heat—if they could make it through this conversation maybe Dopheld could help him feel better. Avoiding the subject wouldn’t improve anything at all.

“Look,” he said, “even though we’ve talked about this in the past, I’m still not sure you grasp how it is for me. I know you don’t like the analogies where sex gets compared to something else, but I’m not sure how else to describe it.”

“It’s not the sex comparison I object to,” Hux said, “it’s the part where you compare  _ me, personally, _ to  _ food _ .”

“I like food. I like you.” Dopheld sighed. “Anyway. Please. Just let me speak for a minute. Imagine the game of sabacc. It’s a game you can play in private or in public, with one opponent or many. You can probably even study the theory of it on your own, I know for a fact that some people just like to watch. Some players get really good at it. Some cheat. Some lose so much money feeding their obsession that it destroys their life. Others are happy to play with just their spouse.”

“You’re really hammering this metaphor into the ground.”

Dopheld shrugged. “Well, it was sabacc or fathier racing, and I thought you wouldn’t really appreciate the riding element of that comparison.”

Judging by the way Hux wriggled in place Dopheld had guessed correctly there. 

He went on, “my point is—I’ve tried sabacc. It was okay. I don’t feel any need to seek the game out, but if playing a hand or two would make someone important to me happy then I’d be fine joining in occasionally.”

“Are you saying you’ve had sex?” Hux asked, leaning forward to look at Dopheld with even more focus than before. The shower immediately plastered his hair to his face, but he didn’t seem to notice.

“Yes.”

“You never told me.”

“You never asked.” Dopheld said. It was the truth. 

“Who?” Hux rapped out the word like a blaster shot, the question dripping with what Dopheld recognised as jealousy. “Do I know them?”

Dopheld’s first thought was the snap that both of them were very likely dead by now, but he didn’t want to linger on that depressing thought. And Hux  _ had _ just opened up to him about his own recent history. 

“I doubt you knew them well. Gunnery Sergeant Seida,” Hux raised an eyebrow at that name, so maybe he had known her and was surprised because she’d been a Beta, “and a radar technician called Mathias. I don’t remember his surname. I only spent one night with each because I wasn’t pursuing anything in particular with them. It was a long time ago. Before we were together.”

“So you can…” again Hux waved his hand and broke eye contact. It was strange to see someone be incapable of talking about Dopheld’s body while also so very clearly aroused himself. “Even though you don’t…”

“Everything works, yes.” Dopheld said. He was starting to get frustrated again because he  _ had _ tried to explain this to Hux before. “It feels nice. I’m not opposed to the sensation. I don’t dislike being close to another person. I just…”

Hux had been staring at the tiles but now he seemed to be tracing something with his toe. Glancing down Dopheld realised there was so much slick across the floor of the shower he see the change in viscosity where it met the water.

“You never wanted to have sex with me?” Hux asked quietly.

“It isn’t a matter of  _ want  _ for me. The things I want are different—to spend time with you, to see you smile, to wake up with you.” Dopheld shifted so his foot covered Hux’s own. He would have grabbed a hand if he could have reached one but he was too cold to move any more. “When we first talked about it, you said you were happy enough with your own hands. In fact, I think you told me you were ‘the most qualified person on board when it came to your own orgasms’. I did tell you I  _ could _ if  _ you _ wanted me to though, and that still stands.”

Hux’s lips pursed like he was going to say something. He sighed again instead.

“I know this would be a change to what we are,” Dopheld said, “another change to deal with on top of so many other horrible things, but it doesn’t need to be as bad as everything else.”

“I know.” Hux said. “I know. I wasn’t thinking it would be bad, I was thinking—no.”

“Tell me.”

“If you bit me and claimed me—not just fucked me—my scent would change. Permanently, because I’d be yours. If Ren is alive he’d never find me by scent then, neither would his Knights. Other Alphas wouldn’t look at me, or at least they wouldn’t notice me so fast, because I’d be yours.”

The part of Dopheld that had mentally labelled Hux as ‘his’ all those years ago was screaming, but so was the rest of his brain, and the rest wasn’t so happy about the idea.

They’d been apart for three years. Hux had been with two other Alphas in that time, and had apparently fallen so in love with one of them that he still smiled fondly at his name. Had Hux ever remembered Dopheld like that?

The possessive Alpha in him reminded him that he’d won—the others were dead, one for certain and the other as good as—so it didn’t matter that he was being asked this now.

The core of what made him Dopheld Mitaka, the part that actually loved the man in front of him, said that it did matter.

Perhaps this was how Hux had felt about their sex life. 

He didn’t like it.

Hux was looking at him again. His eyes seemed to be losing focus.

Dopheld stood and held out a hand. When they touched he had to bite his lip to keep from yelping in surprise at how strongly the fever had returned.

“I smelled Ren in the marketplace.” He said instead of addressing any of his emotional concerns, or answering the question. “Only for an instant, but more than once.”

Hux frowned. “Strange, I didn’t smell him at all.”

“Paranoia, perhaps.”

“Or the stormtrooper armour we saw belonged to his personal guards.” Hux suggested as he climbed unsteadily to his feet. 

As soon as Dopheld turned the water off the honey sweet smell returned, just as strong as before. 

“There’s no point towelling you off, is there?” He asked, watching water drip from Hux’s hair onto a shoulder that already seemed to be drying out again. 

Hux shook his head and stepped forward, his free hand reaching out to grab the front of Dopheld’s shirt while the other laced their fingers together. With every breath that Hux took in his eyes dilated a little more.

“Do you know what you smell like?” Hux muttered. “Tarine tea. Boot polish—the good kind, not the stuff from the quartermaster’s stores. The spice in those little sweet biscuits they made on Arkanis.”

“I’ve never been to Arkanis.”

The smile Hux gave him might have been a grin if it hadn’t been as unsteady as his feet.

“I’ll take you there one day soon, if you take me to bed now.”

* * *

Dopheld’s overwhelming memory of the experience was one of warmth. 

Which made sense, considering Hux was in heat, but he’d always thought the name was much more metaphorical than it actually had been.

After helping Dopheld out of his wet clothes, Hux insisted that they relocated to his curtained alcove, where the warmth of his skin in that enclosed space soon defrosted Dopheld’s own chilled limbs. 

Since—as Hux himself had once said—he was the expert in his own pleasure, Dopheld let him take the lead, and followed his direction. It was no hardship to lay on his back on the bunk and let Hux do all the work...and all the banging of his head on the low ceiling. 

Plus, the slight gaps at the top edge of the curtain gave Dopheld just enough light to watch the changing expressions on Hux’s face, which had always been his favourite part of sharing a bed with him. Hux worked so hard day-to-day to keep his expressions in check that it made his relaxed face so much more beautiful. 

Everything about him was beautiful. That was how it had always been. Bruises, beard, exhaustion—nothing reduced his perfection.

The way his hair kept slipping over his eyes, no matter how many times Dopheld smoothed it back. The way the blush ran all the way down his body when something felt especially good. The way he sighed Dopheld’s name and bit his lip after like the word was forbidden. The way his eyelashes seemed to shimmer in the dark.

Dopheld would never get tired of watching that.

Sadly Hux was the one who tired first, his brows drawn together in frustration as he tried and failed to reach completion for the fourth time in nearly ten minutes. Chest heaving Hux had flopped down on top of him, his skin almost burning everywhere they touched, and nuzzled hard against Dopheld’s neck.

Running his hands soothingly along his spine Dopheld waited for Hux to tell him what he could do to help, but instead Hux restarted his rhythm where he lay. It felt strange to be pressed so very close together; limbs tangled from their ankles to where Hux had wound his fingers into Dopheld’s hair; breath mixing where their mouths almost touched.

He felt teeth graze his neck and couldn’t help but shudder. 

They’d only talked about him biting Hux. Hux biting him though…

“Please, Pheld.” Hux whispered against his ear. “Let me do this. I should have done it years ago.”

It could just be the heat talking. It could be a ploy to get him to bite Hux in turn. It could be grief, or fear of being alone, or any one of a thousand other things. But in that moment Dopheld didn’t care to know  _ why _ , he just knew Hux wanted him to be his.

“Okay,” Dopheld whispered back, hitching his knees up to get a better angle on Hux’s neck and causing Hux to sob from overstimulation in the process.

The pain of teeth breaking through flesh instantly vanished under the wave of the orgasm he hadn’t realised was building. His own jaw had closed in the same moment, filling his mouth with the taste of blood, honey, and fresh baked cakes.

In his arms Hux shook for a few long moments, and then a tongue was licking over his neck while warm wetness spread between their bellies.

“Mine,” Hux said so quietly against his skin that he might have imagined it.

Dopheld licked Hux’s wound in turn and replied, “yours. I love you.”

There was silence for several long, long minutes. And then a snore.

Hux was asleep, with his face pressed against Dopheld’s neck and his limbs still clamped around him. Dopheld tried to roll him away but found that they were tied by his knot, something he’d never done with another person. It was a strange sensation. As Hux continued to snore Dopheld could see why most Alpha/Omega images seemed to focus on tying from behind—it would have been much more comfortable.

Trapped as he was under his heavy human blanket there wasn’t much for Dopheld to do but stare at the ceiling or try to sleep. A few times every minute Hux’s muscles would contract, the sensation of which urged more cum from him. There was a rhythm to it but slightly too widely spaced for him to settle down enough between the beats. He kept almost slipping off the edge into sleep only to be woken by another strange squeeze around his member.

Somewhere beyond the curtain Millicent made an odd chittering sound.

When had he last fed her? Sometime yesterday he was sure. She wasn’t exactly a patient creature when it came to her own needs.

The sound repeated, then changed into a meow that climbed upwards, almost as if she were asking a question.

Being careful not to wake Hux by getting too much light on his face, Dopheld pulled aside the edge of the curtain.

Millicent was standing on his bunk, pacing back and forth with her side pressed against the back wall of the alcove. 

What strange behaviour.

Dopheld yawned, closing his eyes in the process. 

When he opened them again he saw that she was walking like that because a man was sitting on the bunk with his head in his hands, taking up most of the space. 

Well, theoretically he occupied the space, in the same way that a hologram occupied space—pale blue and transparent.

Dopheld’s first thought was that Millicent had somehow worked out how to use a communicator.

His second thought was that his first thought was stupid and he was clearly dreaming.

The third panicked thought came when the man scrubbed his hands over his features and back up into his hair, revealing the face of Kylo Ren.

Or, maybe not, Dopheld thought over the thundering of his heart. This man looked like Kylo Ren in the same way that a younger brother might look a lot like an older sibling at certain angles. He looked like Kylo Ren if Ren knew how to relax. There was no habitual stiffness there despite the obvious tension in the man’s posture. Ren always seemed to be made from stone when Dopheld had seen him.

This man had laughter lines around his mouth for star’s sake, there was no way this was Kylo Ren.

“Do you think they’ll be safe, Mil?” The man asked the cat.

The cat twitched her tail and tried to rub her face along his arm only to stumble through him. 

“Mew.”

“Yeah, you’re not wrong.”

“Meeeeew.”

“He’s as Force-sensitive as a spoon. If I stay he’ll never see me.” He rubbed a finger down the right side of his face, tracing the line of a scar. “But I’ll see them.”

Millicent wailed and made another attempt to rub against him. This time she didn’t stumble immediately. 

“Okay, I guess  _ you’ll  _ see me too. And they might see me. One day. When they’re older. Should I stay?”

For a moment Millicent’s feet hovered a few inches off the mattress as she rested her feet on the man’s leg, then she seemed to drop through him.

Apparently content with this answer the man leaned back into the alcove and closed his eyes, gently resting his hand on Millicent’s side once she had curled herself into a crescent to sleep.

“I hope you’re right, Mil.”

Dopheld closed his own eyes too, determined to tell Hux about his strange dream in the morning, but he immediately forgot about it. 

He  _ had _ just had a very trying day after all.

* * *

“Meow!” Something screamed an inch from his nose. 

The noise was followed by something small and furry patting him on the forehead.

“MEOW!” Another louder scream, another less gentle pat.

He woke to warmth, darkness, stickiness, and a nine pound fuzzy weight sitting on his chest. Whatever the weight was it had sharp points at three corners.

“Millie?” Hux mumbled against his ear. His warm breath made part of Dopheld’s neck sting sharply, like he had a wound there…

Oh.  _ Oh.  _

Dopheld tried to turn his head to look at  _ his Mate _ but instead a furry paw landed on his cheek, forcing him to face forward.

“ _ MEW!! _ ”

Moving carefully to avoid dislodging the angry cat from his chest Dopheld reached out and pushed the curtain back. Light flooded the alcove, making Hux hiss and burrow further against his side. Millicent’s face was so close that Dopheld couldn’t actually focus on it properly.

“Meeeee-ow.”

“I take it you’re hungry, then?” Dopheld asked. The question gained him a look of contempt as fierce as any Hux had ever levelled at subordinate. “Well there’s no question whose cat you are.”

Beside him Hux’s stomach gave a loud rumble.

Dopheld laughed. He couldn’t help it. Of course Hux would demand food just as loudly as his cat.

Offended, Millicent leapt away, leaving a set of tiny stinging wounds in her wake. From the kitchenette came the clattering of her food bowl.

“Okay, okay, I’ll feed you!”

“Pheld?” Hux murmured.

“I’ll get you something to eat too, don’t worry.” He said cheerfully as he rolled from the bed. “And more water.”

It felt strange to be wandering around the ship naked, but if he made Millicent wait for food until after he was showered and dressed she’d probably stage a mutiny. 

Dopheld fed her first, pouring too many biscuits into her bowl to make up for the possible neglect of the last few days. His mind was much clearer now but his memories looking back were still pretty hazy. He’d likely never know if he’d fed her properly. Hopefully she wouldn’t get too fat if he had.

Once she was munching loudly at his feet he turned to the cupboards and the question of breakfast. They had the ingredients now for more exciting food than simply rations, but what to cook?

To his left the slap of bare feet on the deck announced that Hux was also up and about, which was a surprise.

It was even more of a surprise when Dopheld got a proper look at his face.

“Whoa, you look awful!”

“Great, thank you, Dopheld, I love you too.” Hux replied flatly. He didn’t break his stride as he spoke, but he was moving so unsteadily it didn’t really create the effect he’d intended. Especially when he stumbled against the wall just short of the refresher door.

“Do you need help?” Dopheld asked, already stepping forward to catch him if he fell any further.

Hux shook his head. It was worrying how clearly the bones of his spine were visible even at this distance.

“No, I can handle a shower…” Hux paused, his forehead pressed against the bulkhead beside him. “Well, on further consideration—if I’m not back in ten minutes, I’ve probably drowned.”

“I’ll check on you in nine then.”

The gesture Hux made over his shoulder might have been a thumbs up. It definitely only involved one digit. 

Dopheld chuckled to himself and reached for the dried omelette mix. Not the most exciting choice but something warm and full of protein would be a good starting point. He was sure there was a lewd joke in there somewhere, but Millie wouldn’t get it if he bothered to say it outloud. 

He couldn’t believe what a good mood he was in. Perhaps it was another effect of the hormones that had been filling the ship for the last two weeks, or maybe he was just high on getting what he’d wanted for so many years.

Had that definitely happened? As he flipped the egg mixture in the pan he ran his free hand over his neck, just to check the bite marks were really there. 

Yes. Hux had actually bit him, and he’d done the same. 

They were a pair now.

From the refresher came the sound of a prolonged coughing fit that almost seemed to turn into retching. The shower beginning to run covered the noise before it stopped on its own. Hux’s throat was still bothering him then. Living with the dehydration for so long must have been awful.

Perhaps eggs wasn’t a great idea, Dopheld thought.

Hux had barely eaten in days. It would probably take a while for his system to get used to real food again. 

With that in mind, Dopheld made up a bowl of porridge and a roll of instant polystarch bread as well. Hopefully Hux would appreciate a few different options.

“Pheld?” Hux called from the refresher as if summoned by the food. “Could you fetch me some clothes?”

“One minute.” Dopheld called back, and hurried over to his bunk to find the gold-toned robes he’d bought for Hux back in the market. Something about approaching that alcove made him think of blue people, but that was far too strange a thought for him to interrogate properly. 

Hux looked better than he had when he went into the refresher. His skin was pink and clean again, his hair was brushed, and he even seemed to be standing straighter. The bite marks on his neck stood out dark against his skin but they would heal quickly, claim bites always did.

For just an instant Dopheld thought he smelled Kylo Ren again, but it was probably just the scent of Hux’s new shampoo and the absence of the honey smell he’d become so used to recently.

He jerked back to reality when Hux’s fingers brushed over his own.

“Where did this come from?” Hux asked as he took the bundle of fabric and began to unfold the garments.

Dopheld rubbed his neck again, unexpectedly feeling shy. “The market… I uh… I thought it would suit your hair… I’m going to go shower now, there’s breakfast on the counter for you, take anything you feel up to eating.”

He said the last three things as a sort of run on collection of sounds as he hurried into the refresher, suddenly horribly aware that he was still naked and covered in dried bodily fluids and Hux was watching him with the strangest smile.

As he darted around him, Hux ducked his head to press a kiss to his cheek.

“Thank you. For everything.”

Dopheld wished he knew the date so he could mark it, both as their future anniversary and the first time Armitage Hux had ever genuinely thanked him for anything without even a hint of sarcasm. 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time passes, domestic fluff happens...

Stepping out of the refresher, his hair still dripping from the shower, Dopheld found a small pile of clothes waiting for him on the deck.

“If I’d realised we were buying gifts,” Hux said from his place lounging against the kitchen counter, “I would have—well, I would probably have bought you something blue since I have no idea what other colours suit you—but it would have been nicer quality than that.”

Dopheld laughed. “I didn’t buy you clothes just because I was expecting a gift in return—“

“Then why did you buy them?”

“Because I wanted you to be comfortable,” he replied with a frown. “I like to see you happy.”

Hux stared at him, open mouthed, for a moment before turning his gaze to the wall beside him. The look of confusion and disbelief on his face made Dopheld’s heart hurt.

“Well, in that case, you’ll be glad to know these clothes  _ are _ very comfortable.” Hux touched the embroidered fabric where it draped over his shoulder, one finger unconsciously brushing over the bite mark on his neck.

“Good,” Dopheld said. 

There wasn’t much else he could say while he was concentrating on not falling over in the process of pulling on his own plain grey leggings. The fabric pooled awkwardly around his ankles because he’d bought clothes that would accommodate Hux’s extra height. Still, it was nice to be out of jodhpurs, hopefully for the rest of his life.

He looked up again to see Hux just nodded vaguely, his face still turned away. He looked more alert than he had last night, but his face was still worryingly gaunt and pale under the artificial lights.

“How are you feeling in yourself?”

Dopheld mistimed his question so his words were muffled by the tunic he’d pulled over his head, but he still heard Hux mutter, “I can still feel  _ you _ in me, Alpha.”

“Apart from that.” He said, aiming to sound composed rather than embarrassed and rather missing his mark. 

When he uncovered his face again he found himself in receipt of one of the haughty looks that he’d come to expect from Hux. Just when he was starting to worry, Hux let one corner of his mouth quirk upwards.

“I am… very tired,” Hux said. “I feel like I’ve been worn thin to the point of transparency. But I’m sure it’s over now, and I won’t die of heat sickness, so it’s just a case of—“

“Heat sickness? What is ‘heat sickness’?” Dopheld asked.

Hux shook his head as he reached for the last piece of polystarch bread. His hands were shaking. “You really never paid attention in health classes did you?”

“You know I didn’t.” Hux had teased him for years that it was the only class he’d ever completely failed a test for, but that wasn’t the most important part of this conversation. “ _ You _ never mentioned anything about something that could kill you, which would have been sensible in the moment. Why didn’t you say something?”

“Arrogance.” Hux said simply. He stared at Dopheld like he was daring him to object. 

The only reply Dopheld could come up with was a raising of his eyebrows. 

They both knew Hux too well to pretend that wasn’t one of his major failings.

“I assumed it would never happen to me—because it had never happened before—and by the time it  _ was _ happening, well, I wasn’t exactly coherent until you threw me in the shower.”

“Coherent? Hux, you were barely conscious.”

Around the last of the bread, Hux muttered, “Hmm.” 

“Will it happen again?”

Hux swallowed, licking at his lips where the dehydration had cracked the skin. “I don’t know,” he said, “I suppose we’ll recognise the symptoms sooner if it does happen again. I should still get more suppressants though, we can’t leave the ship drifting in space for a week every two months just because I’m too busy to pilot it.”

“That makes sense,” Dopheld said despite a nagging feeling that he was missing something. 

He sometimes felt a little stupid when he talked to Hux, like he was running to catch up all the time. He shifted awkwardly, as if moving his centre of balance would wake up his brain, but the change just reminded him that he was barefoot. The deck was cold under his feet. Perhaps all he was missing were his socks.

To cover for his confusion, Dopheld chose to change the subject instead and said, “I had a look at the flight manual by the way, while you were...uh… out of action. I think I might have the hang of it, but I wanted to wait until you were recovered before I made an attempt.”

“Good idea, I’d rather not have you fly the ship into the side of a planet,” Hux said, echoing Dopheld’s thoughts exactly. “We might have to wait a day or two before we can try out some practice runs though.”

“Oh? Why?”

“Well, right now I’m feeling rather faint, and I’m pretty certain that if I try to move away from this counter I’ll fall down.” Hux said all of this with frustrating calm, like he was talking about a shift rota rather than his physical health.

Stepping closer Dopheld saw that Hux was still shaking. If anything his trembling had worsened from before. There was a sheen of sweat across his brow, but it was clearly from effort instead of hormones.

“Should you be up so soon after a heat?” Dopheld asked, suddenly worried again and hating himself for not noticing sooner that his Omega was in distress. Now that he was really looking he could see that Hux wasn’t putting any weight on his injured leg at all. Guilt hit him like a punch to the gut. Dopheld had just laid back last night and let Hux ride him—how much strain had that put on Hux’s wound?

“I’ve never had one go on so long.” Hux said again as if repetition would make a difference. He shook his head, and his whole body swayed.

Not really caring whether Hux would welcome the contact, Dopheld came around the counter and wrapped an arm around his waist. “What were you eating while you were out?”

“Protein slurry, I think, didn’t you notice?”

“Hux, I spent hours scrubbing the decking, I couldn’t even tell you what I ate. Apparently your hormones drove me into a frenzy of efficiency. Actually…” He wrapped the other arm around Hux in a bear hug and—gently to avoid his injured ribs—tried to lift him off the deck. He didn’t manage to lift Hux much further than a few inches, and that was probably more from Hux wrapping his own arms around his shoulders. “Hmm, thought so.”

“What was that?” Hux asked. 

Even though he’d been returned to standing, Hux hadn’t let go of Dopheld. In fact he had his face pressed against Dopheld’s neck. Every breath across his wounded scent gland made him shiver. 

“I carried you from your bunk to the shower, at the end of your heat. At the time I thought you’d lost a lot of weight but now I think it was hormone induced super strength.”

Hux chuckled. “Are you calling me fat?”

They both knew he wasn’t. Dopheld had been trying to feed Hux up for as long as they’d known each other.

“Never,” Dopheld said, letting a hand run down Hux’s side and dip inward to brush over the little pronounced belly that all Omegas had. 

There had been a time when Hux had done dozens of crunches a day in the hope of flattening it, but the organs behind it simply needed the space. Today it felt warm, and slightly hard. Dopheld assumed that had something to do with last night. Alphas produced an insane amount of semen, it probably took a long time to come out again. He wasn’t going to ask, he didn’t need to know.

Hux hummed, rubbing his nose against Dopheld’s neck just like Millicent in a friendly mood. 

Dopheld had to push up on his toes to do the same, but breathing his Omega’s scent had a wonderfully calming effect on his soul.

Now that his heat had passed Hux still smelled like honey, but it was only a subtle part of his scent profile, half hidden by lemon and spices. He’d never noticed a spice scent on Hux before. Hux had mentioned it in his own scent though. 

Did biting really blend their scents together, or was that just a myth?

He breathed deeper. Honey, lemon, spices, tea, and an edge of something like burning. Not electrical fire, something more organic. 

Frozen to the spot, he felt a ripple of cold down his spine—fire, hot oil, capsaicin, rot, musk—that had always been the smell he’d associated with Kylo Ren and his Knights. 

In the time since they’d escaped, had he ever  _ actually  _ been smelling Kylo Ren or was it just Hux? And if the scent came from Hux was it just a coincidence, or something else?

“Pheld?” Hux murmured, leaning back from the embrace to peer at him. “Are you okay?”

“Yes, I’m fine,” Dopheld replied. He didn’t know if he was lying. “Just… my brain went somewhere it shouldn’t have done. The fleet.”

Hux nodded. His eyes unfocusing as he stared past Dopheld’s shoulder. “I know what you mean.”

He shivered. The movement didn’t stop when it should have done, and Dopheld forgot all his earlier worries in favour of guilt at  _ still  _ not getting his Omega back to bed. 

“Come on, let’s get you settled.” Dopheld said, shifting his arm back to a more supportive position on Hux’s right side so he didn’t need to put weight on his injured leg. 

The journey into the living quarters was only a few dozen steps, but it involved a few stairs and a rather a lot of inelegant stumbling. Especially when Hux rejected his curtained alcove—too dirty—in favour of Dopheld’s own more distant bunk. 

Dopheld would have complained, but as soon as Hux started wrapping himself in the new blankets he’d bought—and subtly snuggling against the place where Dopheld had laid his head—the Alpha part of Dopheld’s brain decided it was in heaven and Hux could have anything he wanted. 

This was exactly what he’d pictured when he first saw those robes—Hux curled up in comfort, his face relaxed and peaceful. As if to finish the image Millicent leapt up onto the bed and settled beside him with a sleepy meow.

“I’ll get you some water, shout when you want more food.”

“I don’t know how I can you repay you,” Hux said quietly. He had his eyes closed. It seemed expressing thanks twice in twenty hours might be too much for his system.

“Well, I’ve been told I would look good in ‘river colours’,” Dopheld replied with a smile he hoped Hux could hear. “If you do decide to gift me some clothes.”

Hux yawned. “I’ll bear that in mind.”

* * *

Dopheld hadn’t actually noticed before, but Hux had eaten all the food he’d prepared. 

He didn’t mind—after all his intention had been to give the tired Omega as many options as he could—but it did mean cooking a meal for himself again. Fortunately Dopheld didn’t mind cooking, even if he hadn’t had many opportunities to practice after Hux ended their relationship.

Every cadet learned how to cook three things—basic dried staples, game meat, and forageable plant life. The aim of those lessons had been to keep the cadets alive in the event that they were stranded on a planet, or stuck doing covert operations far from the First Order’s mess halls. That meant the food would be safe and nutritious, but didn’t guarantee that it would taste any good.

He’d been delighted when Hux first got promoted to a level that allowed him quarters with his own cooking facilities, and he’d made good use of them even if Hux only ever touched the stove to make tea. 

His own quarters hadn’t ever contained more than a washbasin. If he hadn’t been an Alpha he would probably have still had a roommate even now. Well, a fortnight ago. Before everyone die—

That was not a healthy train of thought.

Concentrate on food. One step at a time.

Amongst the dried goods Hux had bought, Dopheld found rice and some kind of flaked dark meat. Fried with the egg mixture he’d found earlier, it was delicious.

Even Millicent seemed to agree when she jumped onto the counter to try to steal a bite.

From the living quarters he heard Hux cough lightly. His throat still sounded rough. Perhaps he’d damaged it with the dehydration. 

Just as Dopheld was finishing off the bowl and placing it in front of the cat to lick clean, Hux’s cough turned more violent.

Between increasingly forceful coughs there was a hiss of pain, a muttered ‘fuck no’, and then Hux was dashing past him on unsteady legs into the refresher. There was a definite sound of vomiting, and a few more muffled swear words.

Dopheld looked down at the cat. “My cooking doesn’t smell that bad, does it Mil?”

She was too preoccupied with the food to look up.

Why had he called her Mil?

There was the sound of running water, and yet more quiet swearing.

“What do you think, Magnificent, should I go and check on him?”

Millicent swished her tail in a way that definitely communicated that she didn’t care, and he should leave her alone to the lick the bowl clean. 

“Pheld?” Hux called hoarsely through the closed door. “Are there any anti-inflammatory pain meds in the kit?”

There were. Dopheld took them over to the refresher with a cup of water.

Hux was pale and shaking again when he opened the door. His lips looked bloody, but Dopheld couldn’t tell if he’d just split them or if there were more concerning injuries involved.

“Fuck me,” he muttered as he snatched up the pills and threw both back at once. The water followed with similar speed.

“Sorry, was it my cooking?”

Hux shook his head. “No, just my throat. And my damned ribs.” He groaned, rubbing his side. “It’s like a feedback loop—my throat makes me cough, coughing hurts my ribs, the pain makes me choke, choking makes me cough. If I can just get my throat healed, I’ll be fine.”

“Do you think tea would help?”

“Pheld, tea helps  _ everything _ .”

* * *

That night Dopheld hesitated when he left the cockpit where he’d been practicing the flight process again.

Where would Hux want him to sleep now that he’d claimed Dopheld’s bunk as his own? Should he sleep in the next bunk along that row? Or the one opposite Hux? Or further away? There were too many choices. 

He needn’t have worried. 

Hux snaked a hand out from under his pile of blankets to grab Dopheld’s wrist as soon as he was in range. As if answering a silent command Millicent obediently stood from she’d been leaning against his back and walked down to the foot of the mattress, conceding the space to Dopheld.

This bed might have been the most comfortable place Dopheld had ever experienced.

During Hux’s heat—when he’d been trying-but-failing to sleep alone—Dopheld hadn’t properly appreciated how soft the blankets were, or how cozy. Clearly he’d made a good choice. 

Dopheld curled around Hux’s back, fitting perfectly despite their height difference, and carefully wrapped his arm around his middle while still avoiding his ribs. As soon as he breathed in he felt his whole body relaxing under the influence of Hux’s scent. 

He didn’t even mind when Millicent climbed up onto his hip. 

For the first time in a long time, he felt like he was really home.

* * *

“You need to correct the yaw about seven degrees,” Hux said, his voice a reassuring anchor point amongst the beeping of various systems. 

Dopheld did as he was told. The ship’s angle of approach to the asteroid they were using for live practice became straighter. 

“Good, now increase the pitch, take us over it.” Hux was curled up in the jump seat—a blanket draped around his shoulders, and Millicent in his lap—looking more like a languid socialite than a flight instructor. 

They’d been working on his flight techniques for two hours now. Things were finally starting to come together.

He was glad he’d practiced as much as he had—there were a lot of switches on the walls that he needed to find quickly while keeping his eyes on the gauges in front of him and at least one hand on the controls. It was very different to the work he’d been used to doing.

During his training he’d specialised in weaponry management. That meant monitoring power loads, ammunition levels, staffing, maintenance. He’d been a low level officer coordinating a lot of very clever people who each had a lot of similarly intelligent people under them. For the most part he watched numbers and told other people what those numbers needed to be. 

If he was on the bridge he had one terminal to think about, and if he was elsewhere he’d mostly worked through a data pad. He’d ensured that the weapons were ready to fire, but it had not been his job to decide where those rounds went. 

Now he was learning how to manoeuvre the ship he and  _ his Mate  _ were currently occupying. 

Even after three days he was still getting something of a rush thinking those words, which was distracting when he was supposed to be learning how not to kill everyone on board.

He hadn’t fully realised how small the Orange Feline was until he was in control of it.

Obviously he knew it had barely four rooms, but so far he’d managed to avoid thinking about how little metal there was between them and the cold emptiness of space. 

Not that size had helped the Supremacy. 

That ship had been ripped apart all the same.

But like all big ships there had been blast doors on the Supremacy. A lot of the crew in the severed wing had survived because the atmosphere and power had been maintained by the isolation systems. 

There was only one blast door on the Orange Feline, and that was between the cockpit and the living quarters. If anything happened they needed to all be on the right side of it.

For someone who’d never lived on a ship less than a kilometre long the change was intimidating to say the least. 

“Dopheld, focus,” Hux said. His voice was still calm, but the use of his full name snapped him out of his thoughts. “We’re going underneath now, but you’re not going to flip us, so concentrate on turning as you reduce the pitch…”

Biting his lip, Dopheld did his best to concentrate on the here and now. 

* * *

It took five days for Hux to fully recover from his heat. He might have improved faster if he hadn’t been hampered by his ribs and the few unfortunate bouts of sickness, though Dopheld was also pretty insistent that he rest as much as possible. 

On the sixth day Dopheld woke to the smell of something burning, and the sound of his Mate swearing at the hot plate in the kitchen. Millicent was sitting by the stairs into the cargo hold, her body twisted so that only her eyes peeked around the bulkhead. Clearly she didn’t trust whatever Hux was doing enough to risk going into the kitchenette itself. 

There was a hissing, spitting sound like cold water hitting very hot metal, followed by a cloud of steam that sent Millicent running for the cockpit.

Dopheld should probably investigate.

He wrapped one of the blankets from their bed around his shoulders—trying to hold one corner subtly over his mouth and nose against the smoke—and padded across the deck towards the noise.

“Emperor’s black shitty worthless fucking bones, how hard can it fucking be?” Hux swore as he viciously scrubbed at the blackened mess in the sink that might once have been a pan. “It’s just powdered fucking eggs and fucking water, what the fucking—”

“You need to put fat in the pan first or it’ll burn to the metal.” Dopheld suggested quietly. 

The kitchenette was a mess. 

If he had to guess Dopheld would have said that they’d been raided by a bunch of illiterate Ewoks who’d tried to cook everything in the cupboards all at once. Of course, he actually knew that this was all Hux attempting to make a real breakfast, but he also knew better than to offend his Omega by guessing that.

Hux sighed, and leaned his forehead against the cabinet in front of him. 

“Fat. Oh for fucks sake.” 

“That’s six fucks in three sentences, might be a new record,” Dopheld teased, as lightly as he could. Hux looked like he was going to cry but he couldn’t help it.

“Clearly you were never in a meeting room after Kylo Ren fucked something up. Again.” Hux managed to say that with a wobbly smirk. “If we’d had a swear jar in there, we never would have needed Snoke to fund the Order.” 

Dopheld laughed and took the pan from him. He appeared to have been using a rag to clean it instead of the sponge that sat next to the sink for just that purpose. He’d never get anywhere with that.

“So, why were you trying to make eggs? You could have just woken me up if you were hungry, I don’t mind.”

“I wasn’t hungry,” Hux said, “I already had porridge.” 

He gestured to a bowl at the other end of the counter. Millicent was sniffing around the congealed mess dripping down the sides like it might be poisonous. Or possibly alive.

Well, now Dopheld was even more confused. He looked up at Hux. 

Hux wasn’t looking at him.

“Then, why—“

“Because you’ve been looking after me for weeks and I feel like an invalid.”

“You were shot, twice. And you almost died from lack of sex—“

“I did not ‘almost’ die from lack of sex.” Hux bristled, finally looking at him.

Without commenting Dopheld kissed him on the nose.

“I wanted to look after  _ you _ for a change.” Hux said. His lips moved like every word had to be dragged from between them, but he didn’t break eye contact. “That’s my job.”

“And you’ve done it,” Dopheld replied. He wasn’t sure if Hux was speaking about Alpha and Omega stereotypes, or just his former role as General. It didn’t really matter any more. “You took the codes that got us off the Steadfast. Your money bought us this ship, and the clothes we’re wearing, and the food you… well, you bought the food. You’re the only competent pilot right now. You’ve done plenty.”

They stared at each other until Hux looked away with a huff.

“On the subject of money—we should assess what we have left, and what we need to do next.”

Apparently that was all the talk about feelings they’d be having that day.

Dopheld nodded. “Okay, just let me get some breakfast and clean up this… this, and I’ll be right with you.”

The pan was beyond salvaging. He had to throw it out of an airlock. 

* * *

The remaining money was still more than Dopheld had ever imagined in his life. 

Hux had arranged it all into piles by denomination, or possibly metal content, Dopheld couldn’t tell. He didn’t recognise any of the symbols or words imprinted on the pieces, but that was just a hold over from the First Order’s refusal to teach its recruits about other cultures. He knew it was worth a lot because Hux had told him so.

“Where did you get all this?” He asked.

Millicent leapt at the nearest pile, batting away a single glittering ingot with all four paws at once. Hux just smiled at her.

“It was Ren’s,” he said as casually as naming a constellation. “Well, it was someone else’s first, I’m sure. But I took it from Ren.”

Dopheld looked at the piles with a new sense of horror. “And you don’t think  _ this _ is a reason for him to come looking for you? If he survived?”

“No, he never really cared about material things.” Hux shuddered. “He rarely changed that damn armour for a start. He just hoarded whatever he took like some kind of dragon. I heard a rumour that his father was a smuggler, so it was probably genetic. People gave him gifts, you know? They thought he killed Snoke, and they didn’t want to go the same way.”

“Didn’t he? Kill Snoke, I mean? I assumed...”

Hux shrugged. “He told me someone else did it. The scavenger girl. I didn’t really believe him. I didn’t really care. Snoke was in pieces, he wasn’t coming back.”

Dopheld looked down at the money again. Millicent was rolling around on her back in the middle of it like the galaxy’s most incongruous pleasure dancer. 

He still didn’t have a proper grasp on what the numbers actually meant.

“How long will this last?” He asked.

“Feeding two adults and a cat, keeping the ship fuelled and running… if we’re careful we could last for five years. Longer if we settled on a planet.” Hux gave another shrug. “It would be a frugal life, but we’d manage.”

Frugal suited Dopheld just fine. He’d never owned much, and he’d lived in close quarters all his life—he wasn’t used to expensive things. The Alpha in him wanted to wrap Hux in all the fine robes and warm blankets it could find. He didn’t need luxury, but Hux deserved it.

“If we found an income though—even if it wasn’t much—we could be more comfortable, right?” He suggested. “When the money runs out we’ll still need more.”

“True. What skills do we have? I don’t know about you but I have no interest in joining a different military.” Hux laughed darkly, one hand rubbing at his leg. “I’m pretty sure the Resistance would shoot me if they knew I survived, and their aim would be even worse this time. Or better, depending on the perspective.”

“Absolutely no military,” Dopheld agreed. He’d been born into the First Order, via the Empire, and whatever else he was beginning to think about those organisations, the Resistance was not an option for him. “I don’t have the training for actual combat, and I wouldn’t be familiar enough with their ships to take my old role. Even if they believed I was a deserter.”

“We did desert.”

“I think anyone running off with a former member of high command would end up being labelled as part of a potential coup,” Dopheld said. “They’d never believe me, no matter how loudly I told them that I just want to nest with my Omega for the next thousand years.”

Hux blushed and smiled at the deck. 

Dopheld grinned at getting the reaction out of him, then tried to straighten his face so he could focus on the serious business in front of them. “I don’t think I have any particularly transferable skills. But I learn quick and we both know I can follow orders. You were always the talent.”

“I suppose I could do droid repairs and the like,” Hux said thoughtfully, looking at his hands. Millicent left her game to see if he had any treats for her. “Most kinds of small engineering jobs, really. I think doing anything bigger than personal ship size runs the risk of me being recognised though. A few months ago I could have walked into any of the major shipyards and found a role as an architect, or an assistant to one at least. These days I’d either be shot or handed a very large outstanding bill.”

If the money in front of them was more than he’d ever imagined, then the order books for somewhere like Kuat-Entralla shipyards probably involved numbers that even droids couldn’t comprehend. 

Fortunately they didn’t have to think so big.

“There were a lot of repair shops in that market.” Dopheld said. “And I bet there’s going to be a lot of ‘liberated’ First Order tech going into circulation soon. We could probably make some money getting familiar gear back online.”

Hux gave a thin smile. “Just no planet killers.”

“No.” 

The galaxy had had enough of those.

“Well, there’s no urgent need to do any of that yet, but it’s something to look into when we find a place to settle.” Hux said. He clapped his hands together with an air of a decision made, and turned towards his bag. “On that note, could you give me a hand with something? At the market I found an idea for making myself less recognisable…”

After a few minutes rooting around in its various pockets, Hux held up a bottle containing a thick liquid. 

The logo on the side appeared to have been drawn by someone who had never seen a real human before. Over the misshapen head was a bright yellow scribble where it’s hair should have been. Dopheld hoped the colour wasn’t accurate. 

* * *

When they finally found Millicent again, all that was visible of the fluffy orange cat was a pair of reflective eyes in the shadows under the main flight console. 

“Millie—“

She growled low in her throat, the sound turning into a hiss when Hux reached a hand towards her hiding place.

“Millie, please,” Hux glanced back at Dopheld, then blushing he lowered his voice and said, “come on baby girl, it’s daddy, you know your daddy.”

Even with a hand clamped over his mouth Dopheld couldn’t stifle the laugh. The situation was just too ridiculous.

Hux turned to glare at him, and Millicent took the opportunity to bolt back out of the cockpit towards the aft of the ship.

“For pfassks sake, Millie, it’s  _ me _ !” Hux all but wailed. 

“I don’t think shouting is going to help,” Dopheld offered, his eyes still tracking the cat’s frantic path down into one of the storage structures.

The pilot’s seat creaked when Hux threw himself into it, both hands clutching at his newly lightened hair in frustration.

“Yes, great, wonderful! Thank you for your contribution!” He snapped, sarcasm dripping from every syllable like the water still dripping onto his shoulders.

As far as the dyeing process went Dopheld thought they’d done a pretty good job. 

Despite the design on the bottle Hux had found a colour that was only a few tones lighter than his natural copper, though the change was more pronounced without his habitual gel. Dopheld had also had the idea to apply a little to his beard and eyebrows too, which kept the colour more consistent than many of the dye jobs he’d seen on the older Imperial officers. It had always surprised him how many men thought they could carry off grey eyebrows and jet black hair. 

Hux looked like a natural strawberry blond now—with his trousers on at least since they hadn’t dyed  _ all _ of his hair—but the realism seemed to be a problem for Millicent. Perhaps she’d had a bad encounter with a blond man in the past, or maybe she just didn’t understand why ‘daddy’s’ voice wasn’t coming from the right face any more.

Dopheld still couldn’t think that word without smirking. 

Hux really didn’t strike him as the ‘daddy’ type. For a moment his brain drifted to wondering what their potential future children might call him—the smirk turned into a soft smile before it turned into a flush of embarrassment.

“Getting far, far ahead of yourself there, Mitaka,” he muttered.

“What?”

“Nothing.” To cover the awkwardness he said the first thing that came into his head. Unfortunately that meant he didn’t think his next words through. “You smell wrong.”

Hux gave him a look that should, by all rights, have set him on fire.

“Sorry, I meant—you probably don’t smell very nice to her right now.”

The look was quickly shifting from fiery to ice cold. “What’s wrong with my scent?”

“I  _ meant  _ the hair dye—I can’t pick up your scent under the peroxide, and I’m sure I heard that animals have an even better sense of smell than Alphas.”

The glare softened, but only a little bit.

“Fine,” Hux said grumpily, “I’ll go wash my hair again, but then I insist that we go to bed. If I don’t smell like me, then maybe smelling like you will be an improvement.”

Dopheld couldn’t argue with that, he recognised their old code in Hux’s words. He didn’t mean he wanted sex, there would have been more discussion for that. 

He’d used that code all the time when they’d been together. Dopheld would get a message along the lines of ‘Lieutenant Mitaka I insist that report be completed tonight’, but what Hux had actually meant by that was that Hux wanted to lean against his chest in bed while they both worked on their tasks. ‘Demand’ usually meant he wanted a back rub.

Hux winked at him as he headed back to the refresher and Dopheld began rearranging their bunk. It still needed more blankets. It was soft but it could have been softer. He wanted Hux to be comfortable all the time.

A frugal life would include a little leeway for some luxuries, surely? Dopheld would make sure of that.

* * *

Somehow they’d found the quietest patch of space imaginable. They’d been able to drift here undisturbed for weeks—first through Hux’s heat, and now just for the peace of doing absolutely nothing but be together. 

It was blissful. The silence, the lack of schedule, the freedom from responsibility. From the moment Ren heard of the droid on Jakku their lives had been a hectic mess. Having the time to simply  _ be _ —it was perfect.

Until it wasn’t.

Dopheld had no idea how far into the night cycle they were, but he was wide awake and drenched in sweat. His heart felt like it was trying to climb out of his chest via his throat.

The deck had fallen away beneath the feet of the Commander standing to his left. They’d been torn apart by shrapnel before the fire of the explosion even reached them but an Ensign had instinctively grabbed for their hand anyway, and lost their own. The bulkhead beside him had buckled, the console turning to molten plast beneath his fingers. He’d tried to bring the weapons back online even though he knew that whole section of the ship was gone. He could see the stars through the hole gaping inches from his feet.

“Wake up.”

“I’m awake.” Dopheld muttered, not entirely sure he believed it himself. 

He could feel the warmth of Hux’s shoulder against his cheek, but it seemed ethereal compared the horrors of the dream still lingering at the edges of his mind. Despite the blankets he could feel the cold emptiness of space pulling at him.

“No, you’re not, not really,” Hux said. 

There was a sharp pain in his side as Hux pinched him. The shock was enough to make him jolt him upright, frightening an angry squeak from the cat who’d been sleeping on his legs.

He was definitely onboard the Orange Feline. He wasn’t onboard the Finalizer. He hadn’t been on that ship since it had been called into help with the evacuation of the Supremacy. He was inside their own HWK-290 light freighter, not a First Order star destroyer. 

Hux wrapped his arms carefully around Dopheld’s waist, pressing his face against his side to kiss the bruise where he’d pinched him.

He was in his Mate’s arms. 

Everything was okay.

“Do you ever think about it?” He asked quietly. 

“I think about many things, Pheld, you’ll have to be more specific.” Hux had snuggled closer to rest his head against his thigh, so he felt his words as warm breath across his skin. Another link to reality. Another thing keeping him sane.

“The Order.” Dopheld said. He’d been listening to the radio chatter. He’d heard the rumours about the name for the fleet Pryde had been commanding. He’d never heard it himself when he’d been on the Steadfast, but perhaps he hadn’t been paying attention. He added, “The people we knew.”

“All the time.” Hux replied. “I have stress dreams sometimes. In them I realise that I’ve forgotten to complete some routine document, but whenever I try to read a name the text turns into blood on the screen and flows onto my boots. Sometimes I’m ankle deep in it before I wake up.” 

Perhaps it was the darkness hiding his face that made Hux feel comfortable enough to admit that. Dopheld placed a hand on his side, his thumb instinctively brushing over Hux’s skin like he was Millicent. 

“I see people reaching for me while the ship disintegrates, but I can’t help them.” Dopheld said.

“Everything went so wrong.”

“Do you regret—“

Hux sighed, cutting him off before he could finish the question. 

“Pheld, the last decision I’m still absolutely confident about is what happened to Brendol. Everything after that... no, that’s not true.” Hux said. He sat up to pull Dopheld towards him. His cheek was wet where Dopheld leant his forehead. “I’m sure  _ this _ is the right choice.”

“Yes.” Dopheld said. What else was there to say?

* * *

The blond stranger doing pull ups in the cargo bay nearly gave Dopheld a heart attack, until his brain caught up and reminded him that it was Hux.

Even two weeks after he’d lightened his hair his appearance still surprised Dopheld sometimes, especially when he was sleepy. In the years they’d been apart he’d become accustomed to the neatly set, darker hair of Hux on duty. 

Seeing him like this—a messy strawberry blond with a thickening beard and loose fitting clothes—it was hard to believe he was the same man. But then he gave him a glare, or one of his much rarer smiles, and there was his Hux again.

Still, he’d never suspected that any form of Hux could do one pull up, let alone a dozen in a row.

“What’s this?” He asked as he crossed the deck from the living quarters, Millicent sniffing around his toes.

“I felt we might be getting a little too lax about PT,” Hux said, pulling himself up again. “I know we don’t have a schedule or orders to stick to anymore, but I wanted to move. Ben showed me this body weight routine that can be done in any kind of ship—I thought we could do some circuits together.”

Dopheld blinked at the name, but Hux didn’t seem to link any particular emotion to it. 

He hated himself for letting that thought even pass through his mind. Most people had a special song or a story they associated with a lover, it would be strange for anyone to have a special workout. 

There was no reason for him to be jealous of a dead Alpha. He’d learned many things from people who were probably dead now, and he would call them by name if he referenced them, why shouldn’t Hux?

They lived together, ate together, shared a bed and matching bite marks, and no one could ever take that away from him now.

“What does this routine involve?” Dopheld asked as cheerfully as he could.

Hux opened his mouth to reply as he dropped the twelve inches to the floor, but whatever he had planned to say turned into a gasp of pain. He seemed to have landed normally, but now both hands were pressed against his side.

“Ahh… frelling ribs.”

“They’re still bothering you?” Dopheld wasn’t sure whether to offer support or not, so he just loitered uselessly nearby with his hands held out while Hux groaned. “Are they still making you sick?”

He’d woken up a few times now to an empty bed and the sound of Hux cough-retching in the refresher but neither of them had really discussed it. Once Hux had properly recovered from his heat he’d put up more barriers against being physically ‘looked after’ than Dopheld cared to tear down. There had always been a limit to Hux’s willingness to show weakness, even in a relationship.

Hux tried to shrug and hissed again.

“I don’t know where any of this starts anymore,” he said, shifting his arms as if testing for more pain. “I wake up feeling awful but whether that’s from my ribs or not, I don’t know. Maybe I’m sleeping with my mouth open. That might explain it. Every time I think my throat is almost healed I get sick again and burn it.”

“Well, you do snore so—“

“I do not.” 

It was hard not to laugh at Hux’s offended expression.

“You do! Doesn’t he, Magnificent?”

The cat, who had finally accepted Hux’s new look after a great deal of fussing, meowed from her lounging spot by an air vent. She was probably just responding to the nickname but Hux gave her a look of betrayal anyway.

“Since when?!”

That made Dopheld pause. Hux hadn’t snored much during their younger years… “Uh, I don’t know. You didn’t used to do it so often…”

Hux touched his nose.

The feeling of amusement left the room in a rush, replaced again by nothing but worry.

“One too many blows to the head I suppose,” he muttered. “Snoke… it doesn’t matter. I guess I never noticed the change because Ren sounded like a blocked drain most nights.” Hux gave something like a smile, but there was no happiness in it.

The mentioning of Ren’s name seemed to remind Hux of something.

“Last time I broke my ribs they only took a few weeks to heal, but I had access to bacta then so—“

“So you probably shouldn’t be doing pull ups?” Dopheld cut in, irritated that Hux had likely been hurting himself all morning for no good reason.

“No, probably not,” he nodded. “It didn’t actually hurt until I had to stop though.”

Dopheld shook his head. If Hux reached the conclusion that he should just do more, Dopheld would scream. Or possibly throw something.

“I guess I just feel cooped up right now.” Hux said instead. “You don’t miss walking the length of a star destroyer eight times a day until you can’t anymore.”

“True. We could go planet-side somewhere,” Dopheld suggested. “There are a few more supplies we should get so I was going to suggest finding another spaceport.”

Plus, he thought, if your ribs don’t improve soon, it might be wise to find a medic. Hux was still walking with a little bit of a limp, but an injured leg can be rested—damaged ribs were too close to lungs and heart for comfort. What if Hux was coughing and being sick because a broken bone was damaging his organs?

If they could find a medical clinic that could do full-body scans, Dopheld would appreciate some reassurance.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... if you have triggers then you might want to check the tags, if you don't like spoilers then you might want to avoid the tags.

‘This Planet Makes Pilots’ the sign over the spaceport gateway read. 

Dopheld frowned at it.

What did that mean? The planet bred pilots? Trained them? Dug them out of the ground fully formed?

Just beyond the gates he grabbed for Hux’s arm when saw what the sign was actually referencing. 

This planet made pilots because all it had was sky—vast, empty, endless and terrifying. For a moment he felt like the ground was falling away beneath him.

“It’s just a sky,” Hux murmured, placing a soothing hand over Dopheld’s too tight fingers.

Hux couldn’t understand. He’d had a childhood on Arkanis, he’d worked for years on Starkiller Base—he couldn’t understand that first moment of terror when the roof was suddenly so far away that it made you dizzy just to look at it.

Dopheld had been born on a ship, he’d lived almost all his life with good solid metal over his head. Starscapes were fine, the stars were always outside his viewports, so if it had been night  _ he _ would have been fine. But in the day, with that vast blue expanse above him and the horizon fading to a haze further away than he could possibly calculate… it was too big.

Of course, he’d done training missions as a younger man. He’d vomited from fright on his first—like a lot of the fleet-born crew—but most of them had involved planets with towns or forests, or just any kind of geography. Something to interrupt the endless up. Even a tree or an awning to stand under would have helped. There was little like that here.

Hux had said this planet was like a grav-ball—almost entirely flat agricultural land with a few hill ranges that ran like longitudinal seams across its surface. Dopheld just hadn’t realised he’d meant  _ this _ flat. The spaceport was on a small hill, the town standing as a slight rise below it, and then there was nothing but waving fields of grass in every direction.

The gas giant hanging in the sky above them should have helped— _ would _ have helped if it had been night—but the atmosphere painted it in shades of blue so that it looked like a section of ceiling threatening to fall.

If Dopheld closed his eyes he saw the bulkheads crumbling around him, felt the floor dropping away.

Hux tugged him closer, wrapping an arm around his shoulders so Dopheld’s face was close to his chest. His honey-spice scent helped calm Dopheld’s heart rate.

“I won’t let you go until you want me to,” Hux said. He was facing resolutely forward but Dopheld could just see that his eyes were turned towards him.

“Thank you.”

“I want to find a coat while we’re here. A long one,” Hux went on over Dopheld’s gratitude. “I feel naked being outdoors without it.”

Dopheld got a sudden image of Hux wandering around Starkiller in nothing but his greatcoat. It was ridiculous enough to make him smile.

Hux was still talking. “Not gaberwool though. Too expensive, too flashy. I want something more forgiving for multiple climates, but still long.” He looked down at Dopheld properly and winked. “That way I can wrap you up in it when we need to go planet-side, so you always have something over your head.”

Smiling at the gentle teasing, Dopheld wrapped one of his own arms around Hux’s waist. 

“I like that idea.” He said.

“Good.”

They were half way down the path between the spaceport and the town when they encountered a pair of beings who seemed to be in distress. 

Their beaks and eyestalks made it difficult to read their expressions, but the much more juvenile of the two was sitting in the dirt with a despondent posture while the other poked at a broken collection of metal in their hand. Dopheld didn’t recognise the species or language—the First Order had been almost exclusively human and he’d rarely needed to go off ship, so his knowledge of other groups was pretty rusty. If he had to guess he’d say they were a parent and child. 

He was a little ashamed that his first instinct was to look around for others lying in wait—the scene did look like the set up for a distraction robbery—but there was no cover for at least half a mile in every direction. Unless someone was hiding behind the small group of wooley-nerfs grazing about a hundred yards away. That seemed unlikely though.

He looked up to Hux for guidance, but Hux was watching the pair with a frown.

“What is it?”

Hux subtly shook his head and said quietly, “I’m not sure, I don’t speak Ishi Tibrin but that’s an automatic dosing device. That the parent is holding, I mean. It looks as if it was dropped. Usually children wear them to ensure they’re getting vital medication on a regular basis.”

Dopheld wasn’t sure what he was supposed to reply to that. He didn’t know anything about medical devices, and these beings were strangers.

Back in the fleet Hux had gained a reputation for being unexpectedly good with children. Despite his usually severe public demeanor, something always seemed to click with the younger cadets. Dopheld had wondered if it was due to his innate Omega nature, but looking at him now Dopheld suspected that children could see it was usually an act.

No one who refers to his cat as ‘baby girl’ and himself as her ‘daddy’ can ever be entirely serious.

The younger—what had Hux called them? Ishi Tib?—was looking up at Hux with what might have been a hopeful expression. Again, the beak was hard to read.

“Do you know how to fix it?” The youngster said in passable Basic. “Papa says its ruined, but I don’t think we can afford a new one.”

The older Ishi Tib held out his hand, the various bits of metal laid out in the middle of his green palm.

To Dopheld’s inexpert eye it just looked like rubbish.

Hux prodded at the pieces, moving them this way and that.

“There’s a screw missing, about this long,” he held up two fingers to show the size, “it should be silver. I suspect the whole device fell apart when it came loose. If we can find it, I think we can reassemble it.”

The youngster still sitting on the ground said something in their own language—probably a translation—then started to look around at the ground nearby.

“I dropped it here, do you think it would have fallen out here?” They asked.

Hux shrugged. “It wouldn’t have held together long without it, but it could have fallen out earlier along your path. Which way did you come?”

“From the town,” The youngster pointed, but made no effort to get up. Their legs were trembling, but not in a way that suggested fear. 

Dopheld wondered whether they  _ could  _ get up. It would probably be rude to ask. 

Something was glittering on the ground, a short way down the track.

With a nervous glance at the sky—still too big and too blue, but now dotted with gliders—Dopheld stepped away from Hux. He could feel his shoulders tensing, trying to pull up around his ears. He didn’t feel safe. This still felt like a trap.

The glittering object moved. It rolled towards him with the same irregular skipping movements as if it were rolling  _ down _ an incline, but Dopheld could have sworn he was standing  _ uphill  _ from it. 

A small silver screw rolled to a stop beside his boot.

Dopheld looked around. Hux and the two Ishi Tib looked back at him. 

He picked it up. Nothing happened. 

Perhaps the gravity just worked differently on this planet. 

By the time he returned to the group Hux had already arranged most of the pieces into a more recognisable shape. He had a small multitool in his hand that Dopheld hadn’t seen in years. 

It was in the shape of a fish with the various tools folding out of the creature’s back like a fin. Once the right tool was selected it could be slotted into the fish’s mouth so its body became the handle. Most of the details on the metal had been worn smooth with age, but it still had tiny red gems for its eyes and an expression of knowing more than it should.

“Thank you, Pheld,” Hux said as he accepted the offered screw and slotted it into place. “That should do it.”

A few moments of concentration later he was holding the device up to the light. 

“Tell your father that he should put some adhesive over the end of that screw if he can’t replace it—it’s either too small or it has become threaded. You don’t want to lose it again.”

The youngster nodded, translating for the older being as he took the device and carefully attached it to their neck. The trembling in their legs stopped almost instantly.

Hux had already looped his arm through Dopheld’s again and turned them back towards the town when the older one stopped them with an outstretched hand.

“He wants to know how much?” The youngster said as their father spoke in their language.

“Nothing,” Hux shook his head, “it wasn’t complicated.”

“No no no no…. no…. no.” 

The father was hunting through his pockets, looking for something and shaking his head as he repeated what seemed to be his only word of Basic. Finally he held up… something that glittered. It looked like a complex knot made from three different wires all entwined.

“Ah!” 

Hux looked at the youngster. “What is it?”

“It’s a good luck charm.” They shrugged. “It’s supposed to protect families. You helped us, so he wants to help you.” 

“Oh, well, thank you.” Hux said, accepting the object like it might explode and placing it carefully into his pocket.

“Do you know the town well?” Dopheld cut in, realising that this might be a good time to capitalise on their good will. 

“Yes.” The youngster said, leaning heavily on their father as they got unsteadily to their feet. “We trade here twice a month.”

“Are there any reputable medics?” Dopheld asked despite the look Hux was giving him. “Human ones preferably, but we’ll take what we can get.”

“Oh, yes, well, she’s okay.” The youngster laughed. “No one is ‘reputable’ here. On the west side of the market, between the music hall and the droidsmith, there’s an alleyway. Tell her the Aymeric family vouches for you.”

Dopheld nodded. “Thank you.”

“No, thank you.” They said, and walked on.

In the time they’d been talking Dopheld had quite forgotten about the sky above them. It felt pleasant to have helped someone, and though they weren’t human that didn’t really seem to matter. How many other things had the First Order told him that weren’t worth listening too?

* * *

This market was smaller than the one they’d first visited, but there were stalls enough to provide everything they needed. Such as a new pan, and complete restock of hydration powders for the med kit. 

Dopheld bought another blanket, and a wide pillow in the same blue green as Hux’s eyes. When Hux asked him why he just shrugged. They could never be too comfortable. 

Someone was selling salvaged First Order ration supplies. Most of the packages were scorched, but the dealer had reduced the price to account for that. While Hux browsed another stand Dopheld bought a few small cases. A taste of the familiar for days when everything felt wrong. 

Other than the odd nightmares and flashbacks, very little about their life together had felt wrong since Hux’s heat, but Dopheld wasn’t so idealistic to think there wouldn’t be rough days.

Given the expression on Hux’s face when he spotted the alleyway the Ishi Tib had mentioned, Dopheld thought he might be in for a rough day already.

He stood by his intentions though. 

They should get Hux a check up, even if there was nothing that could be done to speed up his recovery.

“Is this really necessary?” Hux asked. 

He had slipped two bags into the much larger one Dopheld was carrying, but his hands were too full to investigate what they contained.

“I would just feel better if I knew for certain that you’re okay.”

“Very well, Alpha.” 

“I’m not forcing you.” Dopheld bristled. Hux had sounded far too much like he was accepting a questionable order from Kylo Ren.

“And yet I feel compelled to make you happy.”

“I think that’s just called ‘being in a relationship’, H-Max,” Dopheld said, almost forgetting to use the alias they’d agreed on during their last excursion.

“It’s probably called ‘being in love’, thank you Pheld,” Hux snapped, brushing past him into the alleyway towards a sign that said ‘apothecary’ in eight languages. None of them were spelled correctly.

* * *

The medic seemed to be running her facility out of what had once been a family home before it was stripped bare. The walls still held the outlines of objects that had hung there for years, the floors bore the marks of long gone furniture. Whenever the change had happened, it had been a while. There was a surgical unit leaning in one corner, with more dust on its chassis than any functional droid would ever tolerate.

Dopheld had suffered multiple misgivings as soon as she closed the consulting room door and Hux’s scent was entirely overwhelmed by the chemical smells of bleach and rubber. 

This didn’t seem like a good place. It didn’t even seem like an  _ okay  _ place.

The medic’s clothes were stained in a way that Dopheld didn’t want to consider too closely.

“You’re lucky to have found me,” she said, gesturing for them to sit. Neither of them did. “There aren’t many human medical personnel on planet at the moment—there are a lot of war wounded passing through towards the core worlds. The  _ new _ New Republic drafted anyone who could fly. I’ve never had the head for that myself. Or the ears rather.”

What she meant by that Dopheld couldn’t tell but she didn’t elaborate. Instead she stormed on before either of them could draw breath.

“Now then, newly mated Alpha and Omega, what can I help you with? There’s a price, obviously.” The smile she gave wasn’t a kind one.

Hux nodded. “Of course. I’m afraid you can’t entirely avoid war wounds. I was shot. Twice. My Mate believes I am not healing properly.”

“Hmm. I noticed the limp, where else were you shot?” She was looking Hux over as if she could see the injuries through his clothes.

Hux touched over his heart.

“If you’d been shot there you’d be dead,” she said. “Unless the blaster was set to a lower setting.”

“I don’t believe it was,” Hux said. “The man who shot me definitely meant to kill me. I believe my ribs were broken in the impact.”

The medic sat forward, narrowing her eyes. “Are you a Jedi?”

“I’d rather die.”

“The person who shot him had… access to some unusual resources,” Dopheld said carefully. “It might simply have looked like a blaster. There are ballistic weapons I believe? Something like that, perhaps?”

She hummed, her expression one of deeply unimpressed distrust. Dopheld didn’t like the way she was looking Hux up and down like she was trying to memorise his appearance.

“Boots off, belt off, remove any other metals, and step onto that plate.” She pointed at a slightly raised area behind an eight foot tall transparisteel screen. It was angled so that Dopheld could only see the side edge of the screen. “The scanner will run from head to toe and back. Try not to move or breathe. The process will only take a second.”

Dopheld added Hux’s discarded items to the bags he was carrying, everything except the boots that Hux would need to put back on.

Even though the scanner only bathed Hux with yellow light for a moment, Dopheld couldn’t breathe until he stepped clear of it again. Everything seemed like a threat today. So many unfamiliar sights, so few people they could trust.

“Well, someone’s certainly been in the wars,” she laughed as she studied the scan. “Several wars in fact. Whoever reattached that arm did an excellent job. A pre-adolescent injury?”

Hux nodded, pulling on his boots and refusing to make eye contact. He never talked about his arm.

“Well, clearly I don’t need to tell you about that.” She turned back to the screen, running a finger slowly down the image. “Eye socket, cheekbones, nose, jaw—multiple fractures healing and rebreaking over the course of years. A lot of scarring to the larynx, were you strangled or did you escape a hanging? Fractured clavicle within the last year. Oh I see, yes, are you sure you weren’t punched by a rancor? You’ve broken thirteen ribs in a nearly perfect oval. Some of these have not healed as they should. Two of them are very out of alignment. A little lingering bruising to your lungs. Your liver could do with a rest… oh… well… hmm… yes, I see the blaster wound to your thigh. The muscle hasn’t knitted quite right but not much you can do about that now. The limp might improve, but it probably won’t. Old fractures to the kneecaps…. well, I can say that your feet and hands are uninjured so that’s 10% of your body that’s fine.”

“Can you fix the misaligned bones?” Hux asked, ignoring the rest of her disrespectful comments.

Dopheld was trying to swallow down the nausea at hearing how badly Hux had been hurt in the past. He wanted to ask if Snoke or Ren had been behind it, but now wasn’t the time.

The medic had been doing something to manipulate the display and it took her a moment to finally respond, “There are a few more tests I should do first. Shirt off, please.”

She turned to Dopheld with a deference that stood in stark contrast to how she’d previously addressed Hux. 

“Forgive me,” she said, “but the next part of the examination is Omega specific and an Alpha should not be in the room for it.”

Dopheld looked to Hux. 

“I don’t understand, do Omegas have special ribs that get frightened by the presence of Alphas?” Hux asked. The look on his face would have reduced an ensign to a quivering wreck but the medic just blinked.

“It is always best to know the full details of a patient’s health before performing surgery, we wouldn’t want you to go into heat while you’re sedated because the anaesthetic interacts with your suppressants, for example. The presence of your Alpha may change qualities of your blood, he needs to leave so we can get a proper baseline.”

Hux narrowed his eyes, but waved Dopheld towards the door anyway. In the middle of the gesture Dopheld could have sworn Hux tapped one of his wrist knives. Clearly he could take care of himself.

If Dopheld stopped the door closing the last inch or two with his heel, well, he wasn’t a trusting fool any more. 

“Did you have another Mate?” The medic asked as soon as she believed they were alone. “An Alpha who died in the war perhaps?”

“Why would that have any bearing on you fixing my ribs?” Hux replied.

“Because operating on your ribs this early into your pregnancies would put your babies in danger.”

The floor had vanished from underneath Dopheld’s feet. He was tumbling into space without a single molecule of oxygen in his lungs.

Inside the room, Hux closed his mouth so hard the clash of his teeth echoed into the corridor.

“My what?” He asked quietly after a pause that seemed to last for several lifetimes.

The medic sounded more than a little smug and condescending when she replied, “You see? I don’t ask questions for no good reason, so you should answer them. Has  _ he _ always been your Mate? Or was there another?”

“He is my only Mate, I’ve known him for over a decade.” Hux said. “There was another that I… had contact with when… I was separated from Pheld during the war… I believe he is dead now, but he wasn’t my Mate.”

His words came haltingly like he was testing each phrase for its content before he allowed himself to speak.

“Ah, one of those,” the medic replied. “Your Mating mark is recent.”

“We only made it official once the war ended. You still haven’t explained what you meant?”

“You’re carrying two pregnancies.”

Hux gave a mournful groan that chilled Dopheld’s bones. “You mean twins?”

“No. Well, yes and no. Your scan shows one amniotic sac containing a child at about eight weeks progression, and second smaller sac. I can’t say for sure if it is a singleton yet but I’d place it at about three weeks. Not long after the war ended.”

“Fuck.”

“I assume you weren’t with  _ him _ eight weeks ago.” Dopheld couldn’t see into the room but he knew she was pointing in the direction of the door. He didn’t know for certain who had been with Hux eight weeks ago, but he could make a damn good guess. 

If Hux replied to the question he didn’t do so verbally.

“Your situation used to be quite common once upon a time—it’s instinctive.” She explained. “The body knows it is carrying something a new Alpha would find offensive and tries to strengthen the emotional bond by creating a second pregnancy. People used to write operas about that sort of thing. Whether it’s a problem depends on the Alpha, we’ve evolved enough that he probably won’t kill the interloper on sight but it’ll be obvious it’s not his offspring. And depending on when you deliver his own child may be quite premature.”

Dopheld had heard Hux start to growl at the word ‘offensive’ and the sound had only risen in pitch with every second she kept talking.

“I don’t recommend that you try to pass it off as his,” she continued completely unphased. “He’ll smell the other Alpha in its makeup.”

“What about termination?” Hux hissed the question through what must have been gritted teeth. 

A second ago Dopheld had felt like he was floating. Who knew three words could feel like hitting the ground?

“It’s possible.” She said. “And with enough care you could present it to him as a natural loss, but it’s all or nothing—the other child is more advanced so they’re deeper in your system. Both pregnancies would be terminated. You’ve got about two months to make a choice on that.”

Hux sighed. “No. I meant—is termination necessary to repair my ribs? Are broken ribs compatible with… this?”

“Well, it’s usually best to avoid anything surgical while you’re pregnant. In their current condition, they won’t cause much harm if you wait. It’ll be uncomfortable since the breaks are healing out of place—they’ll hurt as you get larger—but they won’t be life threatening provided you take things easy.”

“How long until you  _ can _ repair them?”

“Six months after you deliver if you continue with the pregnancies, two weeks if you don’t. Either way your hormones need to settle again, but you don’t want to be recovering from surgery while you’re dealing with newborns. If they shift and surgery becomes necessary while you’re pregnant then it would be safest after the younger one reaches the five month mark.”

There was the sound of fabric shuffling around, as if Hux was getting dressed again. 

“Fine.” He said flatly.

“Until you are sure about termination you should try to avoid alcohol, stimulants, and high pressure situations.”

“Hah.”

Dopheld didn’t move his foot before Hux reached the door. He’d forgotten he even had a foot. For the last few minutes he’d been nothing but a mass of panic floating in the endless void of space. Now that he needed to return to his corporeal body he found that he no longer knew how to control his limbs.

They made eye contact for one long moment, then Hux shouldered past him and continued out of the apothecary's door. Dopheld watched, frozen in place, as Hux crossed the litter strewn alleyway to vomit quietly into a gutter. 

“Payment,” the medic said from far too close. 

Her hand was held flat in front of Dopheld’s face. Her smile had not become any kinder.

Dopheld had no idea how many credits he dropped into her palm. All he cared about was getting away from that squalid place.

* * *

Hux was already walking on when Dopheld got out into the alleyway. He was limping awkwardly, the tremors of an adrenaline spike already shaking his frame as he tried to maintain his speed against the pain. 

Before he’d even recognised his own intentions Dopheld had caught up to him and slipped an arm around Hux’s waist from the Omega’s right hand side. His intention had been to support his injured leg but as Hux shoved him back Dopheld also realised he’d blocked Hux from reaching for his blaster properly.

The moment of confusion probably saved his life, because it forced Hux to look at him. 

Giving up on the blaster Hux opted to shove Dopheld again.

There wasn’t much strength in it. 

The third shove turned into more of a collapse. 

At least Dopheld caught him before he ended up on the ground amongst the trash. He felt like a terrible Alpha right now but at least he could do that. It wasn’t much—that might as well be the tagline for his entire life. 

“Come on, let’s get home,” he said with a lightness he absolutely didn’t feel. “Magnificent will be missing you.”

Hux didn’t respond, but he didn’t fight back either. He let himself be led back to the ship like a prisoner heading to his own execution.

* * *

As soon as the airlock opened, the cat began to list her complaints in the form of wailing meows that seemed to go on for far longer than her lung capacity should allow. The volume of these complaints only increased when Hux walked right by her and all but tumbled into the curtain covered bunk he’d set up on their second night on the ship. It was not the bunk they’d been sharing since his heat. 

Millicent begin meowing at Dopheld instead. 

She suddenly stopped, her pupils expanding until they completely filled her eyes, and turned her head to look behind him.

Dopheld spun round but the ramp to the ship was empty. No one else in the spaceport was within even twenty yards of them. 

Despite this Millicent continued to stare, her back sinking closer to the floor as she tracked  _ something _ through the air about six feet off the ground. 

Moving slowly Dopheld reached out and flicked on the overhead floodlights. Hux had theorised that the ship had been used for transporting plants at one time, which would have explained the need for so many UV lamps that Dopheld felt like he was back on Jakku, but right now he didn’t care why they were there. It only mattered that they obliterated every shadow in the cargo hold.

Other than the now angry cat and a lot of afterglows floating in front of his eyes, there wasn’t anything there. 

So why was Millicent still staring?

Dopheld waved his hand through the empty air. His fingers made contact with nothing at all. 

With an abrupt chirrup Millicent turned, and ran through the cargo hold, leaping expertly into Hux’s bunk without a pause. 

“Strange animal,” Dopheld murmured to himself.

Moving mechanically, his brain barely involved in the process, he secured the ship, stowed the food items he’d bought at the market, spoke briefly to traffic control, and took off. 

He wasn’t taking the ship anywhere in particular. 

Just off planet. 

Where he didn’t have to worry about anyone breaking in. 

Where he didn’t have to worry about Hux leaving.

He placed them into the orbit pattern that control had suggested, orienting the ship so the cockpit faced the stars rather than the planet, and let go.

It had been decades since he last cried like this, not even when his Alpha mother died. 

There was no way he could hold onto the stress any longer and he hated himself for it. 

So much had happened in so very little time and now this. 

There was only so much weight he could carry. 

He wasn’t the perfect, endlessly strong Alpha who could face anything and would bravely tear the throat out of any problem that dared to darken his Omega’s life. 

Hux had been a General, and he—only 14 months his junior, from a good family, with his Alpha designation on his side—had only ever made it to Lieutenant.

Now he wasn’t even that. 

Now he was a deserter—no, a survivor of the losing side—no, he was a brainwashed idiot only just beginning the process of deprogramming himself from decades of questionable thinking, and he couldn’t even find the words to tell his Omega that everything was going to be okay.

Hux was clearly devastated. 

As his Mate it was Dopheld’s job to make it better. He couldn’t. 

Not without sounding selfish. Not without rubbing salt in the wounds he didn’t even know the full shape of yet.

Because the worst thing—the thing that made him feel truly, truly awful—was that he wanted these babies. 

He’d never thought that a family was in the cards for him. That hadn’t been down to his disinterest in the whole conception process—surrogates and donors existed for a reason, and clearly he’d managed his part just fine this time anyway—but entirely because Hux had always said that  _ he _ didn’t want children.

When Hux had ended their relationship he’d never gone looking for another partner. Relationships hadn’t been a priority. He hadn’t wanted anyone else.

When they’d been together, he’d quietly imagined that if Hux gave him the opportunity he could be a good father. That a child with Hux would be worth anything. 

Hux hadn’t wanted that then, and his reasons had been good so Dopheld had never pushed the issue, but now…

In the next room there was a tiny part of himself growing inside the being he loved most in all the galaxy, infinitely small but already perfect in his eyes, and Hux still didn’t want it. Or at least Hux didn’t want the half sibling growing beside it.

Dopheld didn’t know the story there. 

He hoped Hux wasn’t against having that child just because he thought Dopheld wouldn’t want it.

Other Alphas would probably think Dopheld was insane, or not a ‘real’ Alpha, but he really didn’t care that he hadn’t fathered that child.

If the medic had told Hux he was pregnant with only one child conceived eight weeks ago Dopheld would have felt exactly the same.

Because it was Hux’s child.

He would love it because it was his. But Hux didn’t want it.

Something soft and warm nudged his hand. 

Millicent was staring dolefully up at him, her front paws on his leg.

“He—”

The sound she made could only be described as a scream. It wasn’t cute.

“What’s wrong?” He asked with a sigh.

She chirruped, ran a few steps out of the room, then stopped to stare back at him. Clearly she wanted him to follow her.

When he didn’t immediately move to do so she screamed again.

As soon as he stood she ran on again, pausing beside Hux’s bunk to look at him.

Did Hux need help, he wondered.

No, Millicent continued on towards the kitchenette where—once she was sure he was behind her—she melodramatically shoved her face into her empty food bowl, glared back at him reproachfully and repeated the same act with her water bowl.

“Sorry, Magnificent,” he murmured while he reached for the locker containing her food, “It’s been a hell of a—what?”

As his breath condensed on the cold metal he could clearly see that someone had dragged their finger over the greasy surface to write the words ‘take care of them’. 

On the next door to the right he could see the edge of another mark. He leaned closer and breathed out again to reveal the word ‘please’. It wasn’t Hux’s handwriting, or his own.

“What the frell?”

He looked down at Millicent but she was just glaring at him.

“You can’t write, can you?” He asked, knowing exactly how stupid he sounded. 

In reply she batted her water bowl across the floor with a clang.

“Millie, is that you?” Hux muttered from the next room.

“It’s okay, she’s just hungry, I’ll deal with it.” Dopheld called back. He didn’t really want Hux to come back here if someone else had been on the ship writing weird cryptic messages. There might be traps. Or they might still be here.

He hurriedly dumped far too many biscuits into her food bowl—and mostly spilled water on the counter when he tried to fill the water dish—before he almost ran to check inside the refresher. 

Which was empty.

The storage lockers around the cargo hold were also empty, as were all five unused bunks. There was no one hiding in the conservator or the sink. The access channels for the electrical systems were similarly devoid of intruders. 

No one else was on the ship but him, the cat, Hux, and the two or possibly more babies he was carrying.

For now at least.

Dopheld hated his brain for adding that last detail.

He leaned against the kitchenette counter and scrubbed his hands over his face. 

What should he do now? 

Show Hux the messages? Demand that they install some kind of monitoring device? 

He glanced at the locker doors again.

They were blank.

He leaned closer to breathe on them.

His breath clouded over them without revealing much. There were a few greasy finger marks, but most of the surfaces looked like they had been wiped clean with something soft.

He tried to give Millicent an enquiring look, but she just kept on crunching her biscuits.

So. 

He’d finally had a psychotic break. 

He couldn’t say it was entirely unexpected. 

Perhaps he’d imagined everything after Pryde fired that blaster. Maybe he’d jumped in front of Hux and this was all the final delusions of his mind as he died. 

What a shame his brain couldn’t conjure something fun. It said a lot about him as a person that _ this  _ was what his brain had created.

His stomach growled. 

Could you be hungry in a moment-of-death-delusion?

Probably not.

He reached for the ration packs he’d stowed under the counter. The first box was the one he’d been happiest to find—a whole month’s worth of #7 protein slurry. Nowhere made this stuff outside the First Order, the rest of the galaxy probably had better paletes. He’d worried that Hux wouldn’t have access to his favourite food in the future, so he’d bought them as a surprise. 

Was it a good idea to give Hux one of the packs now? It felt a little like a consolation prize after such a terrible day. On the other hand he’d always appreciated the snacks Dopheld liked the bring to his office when he was struggling with a problem, so…

Millicent appeared, winding between Dopheld’s legs and making that rumbling noise that apparently meant she was happy.

“What do you think?” He asked her.

She mewed and headbutted his hand. 

That probably meant she approved.

Filling two water bottles and grabbing a vegetable based ration pack for himself, Dopheld headed into the living quarters with what he hoped looked like confidence. He felt like it was knee-trembling fear but maybe Hux wouldn’t be able to tell from the outside. Millicent certainly didn’t seem to care as she trotted along beside him.

Through the gap in the curtain Dopheld could just see that Hux was laid on his side, facing the wall. He was breathing but whether he was asleep or awake he couldn’t see amongst the shadows.

Millicent jumped up on to his hip where she fussily arranged herself into a loaf shape. After a few seconds Hux gently placed his hand on her head.

“I brought you some rations and water,” Dopheld said quietly.

“Thank you,” it was barely a whisper.

When it became clear that Hux wasn’t going to take the items from him, Dopheld careful reached over Hux to place them in his line of sight where they would hopefully not fall onto the floor.

“I’m just over here, if you need me.”

This time Hux didn’t respond.

“Okay then.” Dopheld muttered.

The vegetable rations tasted like tile sealant that had been marinated in engine oil.

His bunk was far too big and empty. 

Eventually the lights went dim for the night cycle. 

Dopheld stared at the ceiling.

He couldn’t hear Hux breathing from over here.

The last few weeks had reminded him how comforting that sound had always been.

Something in the cockpit blipped once, and was silent.

He might as well be the only creature left in the galaxy.

His eyes hurt from the effort of staring at the ceiling and trying not to start crying again.

“Are you awake?” Hux murmured. He sounded like he was hoping for no reply.

“I’m awake.”

Turning his head Dopheld watched as Hux climbed carefully down off his bunk and wrapped a thin mylar blanket around his shoulders. With slow stiff movements Hux shuffled along the row of alcoves until he reached the one opposite where Dopheld was laying. It wasn’t the nicest bunk, Dopheld hadn’t been able to completely repair the padding of the mattress, but after some blanket arrangement Hux was sitting comfortably, with his good leg crossed under his injured one.

Dopheld wished he was sitting by his side.

The overhead light reflected in sparkling gold across Hux’s lightened hair but left most of his face in shadow. With his sharp cheekbones he looked far too skull-like for Dopheld’s liking.

They stared at each other for a few long minutes, Hux apparently unable to speak while Dopheld overthought the question of whether he should sit up to match Hux’s posture.

Finally Millicent jumped up onto Hux’s lap and woke him from his trance.

“I wanted to say I’m sorry, Pheld, I… I swear I didn’t know about the…” he paused, sighing hard out of his nose as if he was frustrated by his own inability to say the words. “I didn’t know. I thought I couldn’t…since nothing had happened during all that time without the suppressants. I’d assumed I was infertile at this point. I had no idea that he’d... I thought my heat with you was a real heat, just a bit early because of the stress we’d been under and how closely we were living.”

“It’s okay.” Dopheld said. He knew he meant it but the words sounded too weak to be convincing.

“No, it isn’t. I’ve trapped you in a life you won—“

“Armitage, by the stars, you have got to  _ stop putting words in my mouth _ ,” he snapped. The name was probably a step too far but he had to make him listen. “It doesn’t matter to me that you were already pregnant. I would ha—”

Hux ran a hand through his hair, tugging at the strands in frustration. “I shouldn’t have made you fuck me! I shouldn’t have made you bite me! You’d be free now if I hadn’t.”

“And you’d probably be dead! You didn’t  _ make _ me do anything! I'm a sentient being! I made the choices I wanted to make. I wanted to help you end your pain! It had been nearly ten days, Hux, you’d have died from heat sickness if I hadn’t! I did it because I love you. You were beautiful when you finally came. I’ve never seen anything that perfect and I promise you that I’ll treasure it forever.”

The only response was Hux huffing again. He kept his eyes on the rumpled edge of his blanket.

Dopheld wanted to get out of the bunk and kneel at Hux’s feet. He wanted to hold his face in his hands so they had to make eye contact. He wanted to do a lot of things, but he was a coward so he settled for rolling onto his side to watch Hux comfortably.

“If—in a reality where we never had sex and you didn’t wear my claim mark—” Dopheld said, “if you’d come to me and told me you were carrying another Alpha’s child but they weren’t in the picture anymore—I would still have agreed to be your Mate.”

Hux winced at the word ‘child’ but this time he didn’t interrupt.

“To me, the fact that you’re carrying my baby too is just a bonus, a wonderful one, but I know I’d raise any child of yours simply because it  _ is  _ yours.”

Judging by his expression Hux didn’t believe him, but his eyebrows did twist a little, like he was focusing on a complex equation. Maybe he could accept it if Dopheld just gave him time.

“What if the Alpha isn’t out of the picture?” Hux asked. “Or rather, what if I don’t know if he’s dead?”

“You’re talking about Kylo Ren, aren’t you?”

It was a logical conclusion to reach—Hux had been worried about Ren finding them from the moment they escaped from the Steadfast. Even if Hux hadn’t outright said that he’d slept with Ren, his quarters had stank of the Alpha, and there had been telltale fresh stains on his sheets. 

There had also been that occasional scent of Ren around Hux that Dopheld now realised was probably due to the pregnancy.

Dopheld couldn’t entirely judge him for sleeping with Kylo Ren. Most First Order officers would have slept with the Alpha Supreme Leader given half the chance. Even the other Alphas.

Hux finally looked at him again. “I need to tell you the truth about Ben.”

“Ben?” Now that  _ was _ unexpected. What did an Alpha who had been dead for a year have to do with a conception that happened eight weeks ago? “You mean the shy pilot? The one who died on the Supremacy?”

Hux nodded. Even in the low lights, it was clear he was miserable.

“I lost him that day. He didn’t die, it just felt like he did.” Hux said softly. “Because that was the day Snoke made Kylo Ren destroy his helmet. He couldn’t hide his true face anymore, it was forbidden.”

Hux sighed again. His hands were shaking. “I’d seen him without the helmet a few days before, on Starkiller, and I thought then that Ben was an alias. I’d foolishly assumed it was all a ruse to get around Snoke’s orders, a way for us to be together of our own free will. A way for us to be soft together, I guess. Let our guards down. I was so wrong. I told myself that I saw hints of Ben in his eyes. Then Starkiller collapsed. Ren was hurt. So much was going on. There was never any time to stop and talk. Ren went out in a TIE to join the attack on the Resistance. He almost left the range of our protection so I had to summon him back. And though Ben had always been the pilot he wasn’t there when he answered the holocall. It was Kylo Ren behind Ben’s face, wearing an expression of hate that I’d never once seen directed at me.”

Dopheld closed his eyes as he mentally scrolled back through the description Hux had given of the pilot. It did sound a little like a romanticized version of Ren. 

Why did that seem so familiar? And why his mind painting the image in shades of blue?

“So you’re saying that Ren had just been playing at being this pilot? Manipulating you? He was only pretending to be kind to you…”

Hux shook his head, twisting his fingers together in frustration.

“Not exactly. It took me months to work it out. I don’t quite know how to describe it, and I’m still not sure I understand it. Kylo Ren sleepwalks sometimes and when he does his name is Ben. He believes he’s a pilot. I…” Hux turned his face away with a frown as if he was trying to remember something, “I’m not sure Ben ever understood  _ where _ he was exactly. That was something I had never noticed until I encountered him in Kylo’s rooms because he was always so affable. I don’t think he ever consciously knew we were on a First Order ship. Do you ever have those dreams? Where everything seems normal until you wake up, and you wonder why you weren’t surprised to be somewhere you shouldn’t have been? But at the time it felt totally normal?”

Now that was something Dopheld could certainly relate to—he had the strangest dreams sometimes. “I once dreamt that I was a king on a planet with vast oceans and I was commanding pirates to find a lost treasure. I’ve never seen the sea in person, but I didn’t question it at the time.”

“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean. Once I’d spent time with Kylo I came to realise that they weren’t the same person, but then Ben would smile at me again…”

Millicent growled slightly when Hux twisted the blanket so tightly around his fingers that she started to slip from his lap. 

“Sorry, Millie,” Hux murmured to her before he met Dopheld’s gaze again. “When I found Snoke dead Kylo was unconscious on the floor. It was the chance of a lifetime, but asleep he looked like Ben. So I hesitated. I had my fingertips on my blaster, Pheld, I could have saved us all this pain with a single shot, and I missed the chance because a flyboy once told me he loved me.”

“Hux…”

“Don’t.” He said the word gently but Dopheld knew not to push too far. “I’ve thought about that moment so many times, Pheld, I should have done it. Seconds later he had me on my knees with the Force around my throat and Ben wasn’t in his eyes. He forced me to swear allegiance to him as Supreme Leader and I still believed that he would wake up. On Crait I managed to calm him down once or twice, so I thought I was getting through to him. Then he threw me across the cockpit of a AT-M6. My ribs broke then too.

“I don’t want to give you the wrong idea, Pheld. I meant what I said when I told you I went to Kylo’s bed willingly. I grieved for the idea of Ben and for my own stupidity in believing he was real, but I wanted that power. And without the filters of his helmet the scent attraction was mutual. In the beginning I truly believed I could influence him if I just tried hard enough. I won’t hurt you with the details of what we did, but I gave as good as I got. I am not—and I have never been—a powerless Omega.”

“I know,” Dopheld said.

“Good.”

A silence formed as Hux ran his hands over Millicent’s back in long slow patterns. Dopheld could sense that there were more words arranging themselves, waiting to be spoken, so he waited and listened to the cat’s contented rumbles.

“Ben wasn’t entirely gone after Ren became Supreme Leader,” Hux continued at last. “Sometimes I’d wake up to him smiling at me in the middle of the night. He’d be so happy to find me in his bed. But every morning I was back with Ren… Then I let Ren go into rut with me. Eight weeks ago.” 

Dopheld felt his own stomach clench at that admission. He’d never had a rut himself, even the most sexually active Alphas didn’t until they’d formed intense relationships, but the thought of Ren going through that with Hux made him feel wrong. It was too intimate. Even if the toys in Hux’s quarters had clearly implied an adventurous sex life, a rut was beyond that.

“I’d been his first everything as far as I could tell, so it took months for him to build to that point.” Hux was speaking matter-of-factly but he’d gone back to staring at the wall. “Ben was there with me, a few times, when Kylo was absolutely spent. I didn’t think anything more of that episode because a few days later Kylo was off ship in search of that Sith beacon, Pryde suddenly had power, that damn helmet was back and everything went to shit. I’d already decided to contact the Resistance if I had the chance, the rut didn’t change that. I knew I had to stop him.”

“So you think that’s when…” Dopheld couldn’t make himself finish the question. He didn’t want the details. 

Hux nodded. 

“In a way, I was relieved when I went into heat with you. I had no idea  _ this  _ could happen,” he gestured vaguely to his own abdomen, “so I thought the heat meant that he… hadn’t…”

Apparently neither of them could say the words any more.

“Pheld, I don’t know which of them did this, and that’s ridiculous because they were the same pfassking person, but… part of me still feels like they  _ aren’t  _ and I… I would want to keep it if I thought it was Ben’s…and I  _ don’t  _ want to get rid of yours because you’re my Mate and I lov—” the noise he made then was somewhere between a sob and a growl. In his lap Millicent sat up to lick at his cheeks. He wrapped his arms around her. “But Kylo Ren… I don’t know. I. I just don’t know.”

Dopheld felt like he’d been thrown into a g-force simulator without a restraint. He tried to push down his emotions and be the steady Alpha Hux clearly needed right now. “It’s just a child, Hux, like we were once. Your father—”

“There are billions of people who’d be alive today if my mother had thought more carefully about her choice to keep me.”

“Stop, please.” Dopheld didn’t even realise he was standing up until he was already across the room and gripping Hux by the shoulders. “Don’t let your mind go to places like that. Those thoughts will not help you.”

“It’s true. If she had disposed of me, maybe the war would never have happened. Maybe Starkiller would never have been finished.”

Letting himself sink to his knees Dopheld pressed his forehead to Hux’s own, forcing him to make eye contact. Between them Millicent had gone rigid, staring off the left side of the bunk and chittering urgently, but Dopheld couldn’t deal with two problems at once.

“The  _ only _ thing that we know is true any more,” he said urgently, “is that Palpatine was  _ always  _ alive. He started Starkiller, you just finished it. Do you really think Kuat Drive Yards doesn’t have dozens of engineers who could have done what you did? You know for a fact Canady would have jumped at the chance to give the order to fire Starkiller. Anyone can give an order.”

Hux breathed in like he was going to reply. Dopheld didn’t want to let him.

“We were circuits in a machine far bigger than we knew. Which part of a star destroyer is responsible for shooting down a ship? The cannons? The processor board that receives the orders from the bridge? The button on the bridge that relays the order? The radar dish that detects the enemy’s location?”

“The officer who commands the ship.” Hux hissed.

“I’m sorry, Hux, but I don’t think that was ever actually you.”

For a beat Dopheld felt sure that Hux was going to punch him, but instead Hux slumped forward with a sigh to rest his face against Dopheld’s neck.

“Fuck.”

Dopheld hummed his agreement to that one very heartfelt word. 

He let his arms slide around Hux’s shoulders at once, and felt a little relief when Hux mirrored the gesture. He turned his face towards Hux’s hair and breathed deep. His heart immediately slowed to a saner rhythm. Only a few hours had passed since they walked into that town together, but it felt like he hadn’t breathed in that scent for a hundred years. 

“Without you the Resistance might not have been able to stop the fleet.”

“Is that a good thing?” Hux muttered bitterly. “I just have more blood on my hands.”

“The more I’ve overheard on the comms, the more I think there wouldn’t have been much of a galaxy left if Palpatine hadn’t been stopped. If every infraction leads to a planet being obliterated… how long until there are no planets left?”

A shaky breath ghosted over Dopheld’s neck as Hux sighed. “I never expected Snoke to destroy a whole system. There was no need for that. I truly thought the First Order was doing the right thing.”

“I know. So did I.”

Dopheld was losing the feeling in his knees where the cold metal grating of the deck pressed into his skin, but he couldn’t let Hux go to change positions, not right now. 

With a determined wriggle Millicent climbed out from the space between them, still meowing loudly. Dopheld felt her bump her forehead against his jaw and Hux’s ear but he didn’t want to move. 

After a moment he heard her drop down onto the deck, pad across the room, and jump onto his bunk with a ‘prrrp’ noise.

“Oh, Millie,” Hux said when he raised his head, “What are you doing?”

Curious at his Mate’s fond tone of voice Dopheld turned to see Millicent ostentatiously kneading the blankets on his bunk in a wide circle.

He laughed in surprise. “She’s making a nest.”

Hux sobbed and pressed his face to Dopheld’s neck again, but there was something like a laugh hidden under the noise. “Even the frelling cat is better at this than me.”

Dopheld stood, gathering Hux’s hands against his chest as he urged him to stand as well. “Come on, let’s get some rest. I know sleep might not happen, but at least we can be comfortable.”

“Pheld—“

“Hux, we’ve got two months to talk about this, you don’t need to make a decision now.”

Millicent scampered out of the way as Dopheld climbed into the bunk and rearranged the blankets so Hux could join him.

Hux hesitated. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Well, you’ve got me, and I’m not going anywhere.” Dopheld said more firmly than he normally would. “Come on, lay down.”

After all Hux had said he felt compelled to make him happy, if Dopheld had to use the effect for the sake of his health then so be it.

Hux was so tense he was almost shaking when he settled with his back against Dopheld. It was difficult to resist the urge to put a hand on Hux’s belly but he knew that giving into Alpha instincts wouldn’t help right now. There would be time for that. He put his hand on Hux’s thigh instead, reminding him that he was here without making him feel trapped.

Millicent had no such qualms, and immediately arranged herself against Hux’s abdomen where she started purring loudly. Somehow Hux found a way to stiffen even further, but after a second or two he relaxed and put his hand on her side.

“Ben gave you to me, didn’t he, Mil?” Hux said quietly. 

The chirrup might have been just a reaction to her name, but it sounded like a yes.

“You’re a good cat, aren’t you?”

If it was possible for a cat to meow in a smug tone Millicent certainly managed it. Dopheld had to cough to cover his laugh.

The room lapsed into silence.

From the cockpit something blipped, just once.

Dopheld could hear his own heartbeat in his ears, and the slow sound of Hux breathing.

The life support systems hummed and rattled for a moment as the temperature adjusted.

“What if it has the Force?” Hux asked quietly. “What if it has powers like him?”

“We do our best. That’s all we can do.”

“Do you think that’ll be enough?”

There wasn’t an answer Dopheld could give to that question, so he just kissed Hux’s neck and tried to believe everything would be okay.

Millicent started to purr again.


	7. Chapter 7

If it hadn’t been for the occasional bout of morning sickness, Dopheld might have convinced himself that the visit to the medic had just been a dream.

Hux never mentioned his condition. 

In fact he almost carried on as if he hadn’t been told to rest at all. 

The next day he’d shown Dopheld the full bodyweight routine that Ben had taught him, and dragged him through at least one set every day. He ran through the forms of the imperial fighting styles they’d learned at the academy. He even started practicing combat moves with his wrist knives, and a baton he’d made from spare piping. 

At one of the spaceports they visited he found a target practice game that would save recharging their blasters, so that was also added to the daily schedule of practice.

More than once Dopheld wanted to ask him to slow down, but Hux always seemed to have the same thought before he could speak. Hux was working hard, but not to the point of exhaustion. At the first hint of pain in his ribs he stopped, and either sat out or leant against a bulkhead to give Dopheld constructive criticism on his form.

There was always something about Dopheld’s form that needed correction. 

Sometimes he suspected that the adjustments to his firing stance—which of course required close physical interaction—were just an excuse to touch him. So he did his best to increase his own casual contact with Hux.

At times he felt like he was living with two cats.

Should he have raised the topic of the babies himself? Perhaps. 

He didn’t really feel like he had the right to begin such a discussion though. 

Hux knew his position on the subject, and it hadn’t changed. 

If Hux chose to keep them then Dopheld would do whatever he could to make their lives as comfortable as possible. Whether that involved finding an income, or a more permanent place to live, or simply doing most of the raising while Hux took care of those things—Dopheld would do whatever was needed.

He wouldn’t be the one doing the real hard work though. He wouldn’t be the one going through the pain, and discomfort of bringing these children into the world. He wasn’t the one with the child of a probably-dead-definitely-awful former partner growing inside him.

From Dopheld’s point of view, Kylo Ren had only provided one cell towards the creation of that child, and while the billions that came afterward were a mixture of both parents none of them would exist without Hux. It wasn’t a matter of contempt—no matter how much he hated Ren—he thought of his own involvement in much the same way. However, he knew it didn’t matter what he thought.

Just because Dopheld thought of both pregnancies as belonging to Hux first and foremost, that didn’t mean he couldn’t understand why the thought of Kylo’s involvement was distressing. Especially given the additional question of the Force—a child that looked like Ren was one thing, a child that could choke you or read your mind was another.

Was the Force only hereditary, or would this have been a worry for every expectant parent in the days before the Jedi vanished? Dopheld really knew nothing about that. He should probably do some research, if Hux chose to keep them. 

For now ‘if’ was the main concern.

Would  _ he _ be able to do this, if it was his body? He couldn’t say. 

He’d honestly never once considered the question—he’d presented as an Alpha male from very early childhood. Plus, he’d never had a partner that he had such contentious feelings about. Perhaps he might have been less enthused about Matthias or Seida having his child, but not to the point of having a panic attack. 

His mind was wandering again, he thought when he realised he’d been standing at the sink with the kettle in his hand for stars knew how long. 

Judging by the sounds from the cockpit Hux had left the room a while ago, after their last training session had finished and Dopheld had volunteered to make tea. 

He really should get on with that rather than staring blankly into space like a fool.

As he reached for the cannisters of teabags he was struck by another thought. Was the fact that Hux had changed his drink of choice from tarine tea to ginger a sign that he was protecting the babies from caffeine, or was it more to do with the antiemetic effect of the main ingredient?

“For fucks sake Mitaka, have a frelling conversation for once,” he muttered to himself.

Millicent jumped up onto the counter with a questioning “mew?”

“I wasn’t talking to you, Magnificent. You’re even harder to talk to than him, and at least he speaks the language,” Dopheld replied, feeling ridiculous as he did so. “What do you think we should do?”

She flopped onto her back, showing him her belly, and wriggled around happily. He knew damn well that it was a trap—if he tried to stroke her there she would absolutely try to bite him. But she looked cute, and he had nothing better to do while the water boiled, so he stroked her anyway. 

After the requisite playful bite and mild clawing, Millicent rolled off the counter and disappeared towards the front of the ship. 

“You’re very helpful, you know that?” He called after her.

“What?” Hux shouted back.

“Nothing, I’m just arguing with your cat.” Dopheld said, finishing off the tea the way they both preferred—’normal’ for him, and ‘so strong the spoon stands upright’ for Hux. Hux might have reduced his caffeine intake but that hadn’t made his taste buds grow back. 

“I worry for your sanity sometimes, Pheld,” Hux said, as if he didn’t talk to the cat every time he was alone with her.

He didn’t turn to look at him as he accepted the mug, but Dopheld could still see the edge of a fond smile on his face all the same.

“I think we all have to be a little insane to survive in this galaxy.” Dopheld didn’t remember where he’d heard that before but it sounded true.

Settling into the jump seat Dopheld ran his eyes over the controls, trying to see if he could work out what Hux was doing. They’d put the ship into orbit around an uninhabited moon a few days ago, and they weren’t currently moving.

“Hmmm, the problem is knowing how far one has slipped into insanity,” Hux said, a little darkly. “Speaking of odd behaviour, did you move the ship last night?”

Dopheld frowned. “No. I’m usually sleeping between you and the wall, I doubt I’d be able to get out of there without waking you. Why, is the ship not where we left it?”

He looked out at the moon they were orbiting. The grey rocky plain below looked just like the rest of the grey rocky surface. 

“We haven’t moved by much,” Hux said, pointing at a screen showing last night’s data. “Just a few metres here and there, but looking back through the navigational records these small course corrections have happened a lot.”

“What times?” Dopheld pulled his personal chronometer from his pocket, feeling a familiar sense of guilt as he did so.

He’d found the device while he was first cleaning the ship, though it had taken a week or two of inexpert fumbling to get it working again. Since they didn’t have a reason to get up at any particular time he hadn’t found much use for it—until their visit to the medic. 

She’d said that Hux had two months to make a decision. So Dopheld had set a reminder on the chronometer for two months minus four days, in case he needed to get Hux back to that planet in time for the procedure. He didn’t exactly  _ want _ to, but he felt strongly that as an Alpha it was his job to keep track of his Mate’s health.

“Today—3:15am and 4:27am. The number of times a day varies though.” Hux said. He was scrolling back further through the data. “Huh, looks like there were a lot of them during my heat, and some before you learned to operate the controls. I suppose there’s no way you could be responsible for those.”

“Perhaps there’s an element to the proximity sensor system that’s being recorded as a manual adjustment rather than automatic?” Dopheld suggested. “We did put the ship back together pretty quickly.”

“True. The system could be protecting us from debris.” Hux stretched and ran his hands back through his hair. The darker roots were beginning to show through, but it still looked natural enough. “Didn’t you get that system back online?”

Dopheld nodded while he sipped his tea. “I think so, it was similar enough to an automatic targeting array that I felt confident with it. I don’t remember seeing anything unusual, but First Order systems are all pretty standardised. I might not have recognised anything extra.”

“Well, I was going to go do a tour of the engineering deck and inspect the troops; but we only have one deck and I can see from here that you two are fine.” Hux laughed. The sound was surprisingly light given the last few difficult weeks. “So I guess in the absence of anything else to do, I might as well take the proximity system apart, just to be sure.”

“Have fun,” Dopheld said with a wink. He knew Hux would probably be swearing at something before half an hour had gone by, but for now he wasn’t going to disrupt his good mood. Especially when they had plenty of time left to think about their options.

He glanced at his chronometer again.

Forty three days left.

* * *

Two days, and most of the ship being stripped apart later, Dopheld was in the kitchenette, trying to work out what he could make with four different kinds of carbs, when Hux appeared on the stairs to the living quarters wearing a look of defeat.

“Millie?” Hux called. 

The cat looked up from her careful study of a tiny bit of fluff to glance in Hux’s direction, but she didn’t respond. 

“Have you been touching any of the controls in there?” He asked, pointing behind him towards the cockpit.

Millicent yawned and stretched, her eyes closing slowly. 

“Well, have you?”

She curled up on the deck with her back to him. 

“I seem to remember that  _ you _ were questioning  _ my _ sanity quite recently,” Dopheld said as Hux trudged down the stairs and propped himself against the counter next to him. To soften his words he leant up and kissed Hux on the cheek. 

“I’m not sure I’ve felt completely sane in… years probably.”

“Personally, I think it’s overrated.”

“I’ve checked every single element that could have affected the course of the ship. There are no additional systems hooked up to the proximity sensors, the security systems, the flight control panels, or in fact  _ anywhere  _ else. Nothing.” Hux said. “There are several circuits that’ll need replacing sooner rather than later, plus two that have never been connected at all, but nothing that could magically move the ship.” 

He sighed, turning to wrap his arms lightly around Dopheld’s waist. After a moment he pressed his face against his hair as well. “It’s probably hormones but you smell incredible right now.”

It would have been easy to freeze in panic at Hux’s first mention of his condition in nearly three weeks, but Dopheld managed to keep his head and return the embrace. 

“Maybe I always smelled amazing and you’re only just realising it because you’re drinking less tea these days,” he said in what he hoped would be taken as a teasing tone.

“You noticed that?” 

“I am usually the one making the tea,” Dopheld said, leaning back just enough to kiss him before returning to his place so that Hux could keep on nuzzling his hair. “ _ Someone _ can’t be trusted with the kitchen equipment before he’s fully awake.”

Hux snorted. “True…”

He paused as if he was going to say something, but the silence grew without interruption.

“Do you have any preferences for dinner? Anything in particular you want?” Dopheld asked when it seemed that they could well be standing there in that hug forever.

“You.” Hux muttered.

“You can’t eat me. That’s only for emergencies.”

That time Hux laughed, but he didn’t loosen his arms. Dopheld could hear him drawing in breath and then swallowing, as if he couldn’t find the words, or perhaps the bravery to speak.

“Or did you mean something else?”

“It’s okay if you don’t want to, but…” Hux paused again, the nervousness in his voice so uncharacteristic that it made Dopheld’s skin tingle. “Can I take you to bed?”

“Not for sleep?” Dopheld asked. He thought he already knew the answer, but he’d rather Hux say it than trust his own guesses. 

When Hux didn’t answer right away Dopheld rubbed his back and did his best to press closer.

“Because I would be completely fine with that, if that’s the case.” He added. 

Perhaps the idea that Alphas and Omegas telegraphed all their emotions by scent was something of an exaggeration, but he did his best to fill his heart with fondness, just in case it helped.

Hux’s voice was shaking when he replied. “Yes, please. I want to be as close as possible to you, right now.”

Dopheld nodded and let himself be led into the other room. “Of course, whatever you need.”

* * *

Hux was asleep across his chest, one leg hooked over Dopheld’s own, a warm and reassuring weight. 

In the First Order there had always been a risk of getting summoned to the door in the middle of the night for an emergency. In fact, during his days as a Captain, Hux had suffered a recurring nightmare about arriving naked on the bridge during combat. At least that was no longer a concern.

It felt odd to share a bed naked. Of course Dopheld had never really had a reason to sleep nude before now; the skin-to-skin contact seemed to be helping Hux’s mental health, so he didn’t mind. It was odd, but nice.

The blankets were warm enough. 

Millicent was snoring somewhere near his feet.

His arm was trapped between his side and Hux’s front. Specifically, the back of his hand was pressed hard against the curve of Hux’s belly.

Dopheld couldn’t feel much beyond warm skin and the crisp curl of body hair, but his mind was trying to race with things he didn’t actually know. 

Eleven and six weeks—how big would they be? Could he really feel them yet? Unlikely, but could Hux feel them? What would they look like if he could see them?

He needed to do some research. It was a running joke that he’d never paid attention in class, but it was embarrassingly accurate. He couldn’t remember anything beyond ‘forty weeks is full term’ and ‘twins are rarely full term’. When would it be safe for them? Since his child would be five weeks younger what difference would that make? Would they need to find help if Hux kept them?

There was a single blip sound from the next room. 

“Hux?” He murmured, not really wanting to wake him up.

It seemed that Hux agreed because he burrowed closer to Dopheld’s side with a sleepy “hmmmm?”

“Something made a noise in the cockpit.”

“‘s just the cat…”

Millicent leapt onto their knees to join the conversation with an angry meow.

“Oh for fu—“ Hux sighed and rolled out of bed, Dopheld following close on his heels. Millie took the opportunity to steal the warm spot where they’d been sleeping.

The cockpit was exactly as they’d left it. Everything but the navigation display which read ‘eight degree course adjustment accepted’. As they stared at it the screen went dark again.

“Did you—“

“Hux, I’ve still got the outline of your hand where it’s been on my chest for the last hour.” Dopheld said, trying not to roll his eyes. “I don’t know how I could ha—“

His words were swallowed up by the sudden vibration of the ship. The noise started at the rear but quickly worked its way forward.

Hux climbed on to the pilot’s seat as if he could see behind the ship by leaning close enough to the side window. It wouldn’t have been a dignified maneuver at the best of times, but naked it was pretty much ridiculous. 

He needn’t have bothered—the view was almost instantly obscured by the bulk of a comet passing far too close to the ship for comfort.

They watched it drift away, the trailing stream of ice shards pinging off the hull for long minutes after the main bulk had passed by. 

“Fuck.” Hux said, sitting down hard enough to rock the seat he’d been kneeling on. “If the course hadn’t changed, that would have gone straight through us.”

“It must be the proximity sensors, or something,” Dopheld suggested, weakly. He felt like his heart was trying to crawl out of his mouth. The star destroyers he’d grown up on wouldn’t have even noticed a comet so small, but it was almost as big as the entire Orange Feline.

“I’m telling you, there’s nothing else connected to that system.”

Hux was pressing buttons with far more force than necessary, clearly looking for something. Dopheld wished there was something he could do to help.

“Frankly, I’d say we weren’t alone on this ship if there were actually anywhere on board large enough for a person to hide.” Hux grumbled when it became clear that the computer couldn’t tell him anything new.

Dopheld opened his mouth to laugh, then stopped. The writing on the lockers in the kitchen. There had been something else too, hadn’t there? Something blue? He tried to think about that idea, but his mind slipped away from the concept like a name that was just out of reach.

“What is it?” Hux asked. He was staring intently at him, as if he could read something in his expression. “Pheld, do you think there’s someone here?”

“No… no, I don’t…” He didn’t. But there was something about voices in the night. Wasn’t there?

Hux had a firm grip on his upper arms now. “Are you sure? Have you seen something?”

“I don’t know.” 

“‘Don’t know’ isn’t ‘no’—what have you seen?”

There was a rising fear in Hux’s voice that made Dopheld panic in turn. He felt like he couldn’t trust his own thoughts because he couldn’t reach the end of them and that just added to the spiralling worry. 

“I—I thought I saw writing on the cabinets, in the kitchen.” Dopheld said at last. He couldn’t make eye contact with Hux so he stared at a wall panel behind him. “Millicent was acting strangely when we came back from the… After we found out about the babies. I thought someone had been on the ship so I searched it, even places most sentients couldn’t fit, but there was no one there and when I went back to look at the writing again, it was gone. I thought I’d had a mental breakdown. Too much stress. Then I forgot about it.”

That last part wasn’t entirely true—he hadn’t forgotten, he’d just chosen not to care about it anymore. 

“You  _ forgot _ ?” Hux asked in a strange tone of voice. “Have you  _ forgotten  _ anything else? No, do you feel like you’ve forgotten something else? That feeling that you’ve walked into a room for something, but you can’t remember what it was?”

Dopheld tried to explain but he couldn’t even articulate the concept. All he could say was, “Yes.”

“Fuck.”

Hux pushed past him, almost running to the alcove where they stored their clothes. 

“There’s someone here,” he said, his voice muffled by the tunic he was frantically dragging over his head. “There’s someone here, spying on us, and they’re making you forget that.”

“What?” If Dopheld had felt lost before he was absolutely baffled now. “Where? Hux, if you stand here and I stand in the cargo bay there’s nowhere on this ship that we can’t see. How would anyone be hiding on board? I panicked, it was irrational.”

“Do you know what a mind-trick is?”

“A Jedi mind-trick, you mean? Yes.” Dopheld had heard the stormtroopers complaining about Ren messing with them when the man first came onboard to Finalizer. He’d never witnessed it himself. “No. There’s no way Ren is on this ship, there’s no space.”

“That’s what he’d make you think,” Hux said. The leggings he was trying to pull on seemed to be too tight around the waist, but Hux didn’t acknowledge that fact, he just tugged irritably at the elastic as he spoke. “He did it to me constantly. I’d find myself at the wrong end of the Steadfast for no damn reason, or I’d realise I was eating something I hated, or I’d wake up in his room with no idea how I got there.”

“That sounds awful, but there’s no way Ren is on this ship.”

“We don’t know that,” Hux snapped.

“You’re talking about short term effects, not literally months of hiding!” Dopheld replied, trying to keep his tone as calm as he could. “He’s taller than either of us, he’d probably as wide as both of us combined, and he’s an Alpha—we’d definitely be able to smell him. There’d be food missing! Extra water usage! Besides,  _ why _ would he be hiding for that long? Do you really think he would have stayed hidden through your heat? That he wouldn’t have reacted to hearing that you’re pregnant?”

Hux glanced fearfully over his shoulder. “Stop it!”

“There’s no one else here!”

“I don’t feel safe!”

They stared at each other, each simultaneously realising that they were shouting.

Dopheld felt like a terrible Alpha. He was arguing with his pregnant Mate, in the middle of a ship that was probably already starting to feel like a nest to Hux. Omegas had to feel safe in their nests or they couldn’t settle, everyone knew that. 

“I’m sorry, you’re right,” he said. “We need to make sure. You said there were circuits that needed replacing? How about we go planet-side, get out of the ship for a while and maybe pick up some kind of surveillance system while we’re buying the new circuits? You can’t Jedi mind-trick a security camera.”

“You don’t believe me, do you?” Hux muttered, even as he reached for one of the concealed compartments where they’d hidden the money. 

“I believe that you don’t feel safe.” Dopheld said. He stepped forward, placing a hand on his shoulder as an invitation to an embrace if Hux wanted one. “I believe that something weird is going on. That’s all I need to know.”

“Fine.”

Hux didn’t turn to face him. 

Terrible Alpha indeed.

* * *

Hux elected to go off on his own once they’d secured the ship. 

The spaceport they’d landed at was attached to a mid-sized town that seemed to have grown up the cliffs around a busy harbour.

Dopheld found that if he concentrated on the buildings and tropical plants around him—rather than on the sea where it vanished into the horizon—he felt pretty comfortable walking around. Apparently, the short excursions they’d made over the last few weeks had helped a lot. He wished he could tell Hux about this new discovery, but he’d long since vanished into the crowd with his list of ship parts.

There wasn’t much Dopheld really needed to do. They were mostly stocked up on rations, though he might try to get one or two treats. They didn’t need anything else for the ship that Hux wasn’t handling. 

Not far from the spaceport stood a sizable messaging station—a multistorey building filled with access terminals that could be rented by the public. It had probably been built there to take advantage of the communications array behind the spaceport, and to act as a postal address for regular travellers through the area. 

After a few minutes of loitering by the door Dopheld saw that there wasn’t much of a security protocol involved in getting use of a terminal. He’d worried that he would need some kind of identification, but money seemed to be enough.

He grabbed an old datapad from the ship and headed inside to do some research.

Anything he needed to refer to later he could save to the pad. There was going to be a lot more than he could possibly absorb in a day.

* * *

“Hey, babe. How you doing?” Drawled a slightly unconvincing Correlian.

The arms draped around his neck was a shock that only Hux’s familiar scent had defused enough to keep Dopheld from jumping in fright.

“H-hi, Max. I’m good,” he replied, hastily minimising his screen in the hope that Hux hadn’t seen the subject. “How long have you been there?”

“I just came in from the street, saw your beautiful neck.” Hux chuckled in a way that would have sounded drunk if it weren’t for the complete lack of alcohol smell on his breath. “I’d know my claim mark anywhere. Come on, it’s time to make a proper start on this honeymoon.”

If the embrace had been unexpected, the sultry ear nibbling was bewildering. 

What honeymoon?

Something must be going on.

“Can I have a minute to save my work?” he asked, hoping that Hux would understand the subtext of ‘is there an immediate threat?’

Hux nodded and kissed his cheek hard enough that his beard scratched at Dopheld’s skin. “Sure, I need to go get the cat anyway. I’ll meet you outside in five.”

It didn’t take Dopheld long to finish his downloads and close off the terminal, but when he got outside Hux was already waiting by the doors for him. He was wearing a long coat Dopheld didn’t recognise, with a large bag in one hand, and Millicent draped sleeping around his shoulders like a fur stole. 

“Finally, what took you so long, babe?” Hux purred, the accent grating over Dopheld’s nerves like broken glass. He looped an arm through Dopheld’s own and started to walk them down hill towards the seafront. “It’s not fair to keep me waiting when we’ve got new beginnings to celebrate.”

Dopheld wanted to argue but since he had no idea what the hell Hux was talking about, he just muttered an apology and tried to keep an eye on the crowd.

The town was bustling, but in a different way to most of the spaceports they’d visited. There seemed to be a lot more relaxation going on than he’d usually see. Live music playing from busy bars and cafes that spilled onto the streets so completely that it felt as if no one here ever ate indoors. Small shops glittered and shone with garish clothes and little trinkets. Couples stood kissing in doorways or cuddled together in alcoves to watch the world go by.

It would have been a beautiful place to be, if Hux hadn’t been behaving so strangely.

“Here we are, darling, just as I promised,” Hux said, gesturing to the pastel coloured facade of a hotel. Dopheld had only seen places like this in old holos, and he certainly hadn’t been promised anything.

Again, Hux kissed him harder than necessary and pulled him towards the doors. 

The bored looking Togruta behind the desk tried to give them a sincere smile, but it was disrupted by a yawn. 

“Welcome back, Mr Hitaka.” She said at last, speaking first to Hux then turning to Dopheld. “You must be the other Mr Hitaka, welcome, congratulations on your family.”

“Uh, thank you.” Dopheld replied automatically. 

“Your room is ready now, so here are your keys.” She went on, clearly reciting a memorised script. “We don’t serve food here but you’re welcome to bring anything back that you’d like. I understand the restaurant to the left of our building is excellent for humans. You’re booked in for seven days, but if you wish to extend your stay please let us know at least ten hours before you’re due to leave.”

She’d barely started that last sentence before Hux was Dopheld up the stairs she’d gestured towards when she mentioned their room.

“Thank you, sweetheart,” Hux drawled over his shoulder. The accent still sounded wrong.

Before Dopheld could comment on that he found himself being fiercely kissed backwards through a doorway. 

“Mmm… let’s start this honeymoon with a shower together,” Hux murmured against his lips.

From there the scene was a confusing series of sounds and gestures—the door being locked, Millicent jumping onto the bed with an disgruntled meow, clothes being flung off, water rushing—and then Dopheld was standing in the shower, soaking wet and still wearing his underpants as Hux closed the cubicle door behind him.

Dopheld couldn’t stand it any longer. 

“I’m sorry, I can’t… what the fuck is going on?!” He hissed, leaning close to Hux’s ear to be heard under the roar of the water.

“I killed someone.”

Despite the heat of the shower Dopheld’s blood turned cold. He wanted to pull away from Hux, but Hux had wrapped an arm tight around his shoulders to keep him close. 

“What?” He realised that the question sounded stupid as soon as he’d asked it, but apparently he couldn’t manage more than one word at a time. “Who?”

“A slicer,” Hux said, “I don’t remember his name. The one who sold me the Resistance agents on the Supremacy, when they tried to disable the hyperspace tracking system.”

Dopheld had very little idea what Hux was talking about—he hadn’t had the rank to be privy to more than rumours about what happened on the flagship.

“You don’t remember his name, but you still killed him?”

Hux was staring at the tiles, his jaw clenched so tight that his face was turning pink with the strain. “He threatened us.”

Between them Dopheld felt Hux’s free hand slide down to cradle the slight swell of his stomach.

“What? Where were you?”

“I… I was in a reproductive health clinic, speaking to a technician when this voice called out to me, like we were friends.” Hux said in icy quiet tones, still not looking at him. “The man was strapped to a treatment table. I don’t know what they were treating but he had multiple IVs running into him. He spoke so lightly that no one else would have realised the danger in what he was saying. He thought I was an Alpha who’d got an Omega into trouble. He implied that I should pay his bill and a lot more besides, or he’d make sure I’d never see this hypothetical Omega again. I said I’d worked for the Resistance, I hoped that would close off his markets. But he just said he’d sell me to the Hosnian diaspora. When no one was looking, not even him, I’d already injected air into his IVs. I told him I’d make everything right if he gave me a little time to get the money. And then I went back to talking to the technician until I heard him seizing out.”

“Are you sure he’s dead?”

Hux was usually right about such things—Dopheld knew what had happened to Brendol after all—but it was a question that had to be asked, given Hux’s own almost-death.

“Yes. I tried to ‘help’ the technicians, I saw enough.” 

The way Hux said ‘help’ made the hairs on Dopheld’s nape stand on end. This was a side of his General that he hadn’t seen since… well, since he’d become a General. Hux had once been a man who’d fight for whatever matter to him most, apparently that was ‘us’ now.

“Then why are we here? Why aren’t we getting off the planet?” Dopheld asked, wondering why they were play-acting like this if the threat was already neutralised.

“Because running would raise suspicions and draw attention.” Hux said flatly. “Those technicians saw me speak to him as a friend. I offered to try to contact his superiors or I’d pay for his burial myself. If we run they’ll call in the debt. There’s a risk we’ll be recognised.”

As Dopheld opened his mouth to ask why Hux had agreed to that, or who this person’s ‘superiors’ were, Hux finally turned to face him. Despite them only waking up a few hours earlier Hux looked like he hadn’t slept in a week.

“I don’t want to get back on that ship until I’ve repaired it and installed enough security systems to keep us safe.” He said, then nodded back towards the rest of the hotel room. “First I want to make sure we’re safe  _ here _ . The water should have blocked the sound of this conversation, but we can’t keep running the water indefinitely.”

With that Hux was gone again, leaving Dopheld standing under the spray in his wet underwear. He opted to wash up before he followed him. 

There was something bugging him about that conversation, beyond the obvious fact that Hux had killed someone. Perhaps if he stared at the tiles for long enough he’d remember what it had been.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I took the 'Hux is not nice' tag out when I posted chapter 6 and I guess Hux didn't appreciate that. Sorry DJ...


	8. Chapter 8

“Why were you in a reproductive health clinic?” Dopheld asked quietly as he pulled on his socks. The bed was so soft he’d almost fallen off it when he sat down—apparently that moment of fright had given him the strength to ask the question that had been buzzing through his brain for the last ten minutes.

Hux was sitting on the floor surrounded by ship parts, carefully arranging them in the order they would be needed. Beyond him Millicent was sniffing around the edges of the room. Neither of them looked up at where Dopheld had sat.

“It doesn’t matter,” Hux said. He turned over a small camera unit to poke at the insides with a screwdriver.

“Hu—”

“It. Doesn’t. Matter.”

Dopheld knew he should drop the subject, but his mouth didn’t get the memo. “Have you made a decision?”

“No.”

“Wi—”

“I do not want to talk about this right now.”

“Then when?”

Hux shrugged. 

Just like that the conversation ended. 

Dopheld wished he had the will to force it to continue, but he didn’t. He pulled out the datapad he’d filled at the messaging station, laid back on the bed and opened a document at random. 

> _ Superfetation In Humans: Superfetation is the formation of an embryo from a different estrus/heat cycle than an existing embryo already present in the uterus. [Multiple separate fertilizations from the same estrus/heat cycle is known as superfecundity, see section 12.] Although vanishingly rare in Betas, superfetation has been seen to occur in Omegas where it is believed to account for approximately 0.02% of births annually, of which the majority of fertilizations can be attributed to multiple Alpha Mates.  _
> 
> _ It has long been a superstition that the grief of a widowed Omega will naturally trigger this condition with a new Alpha. However, the rise of polyamory through the encouragement of the Galactic Empire has demonstrated that this may simply be a feature of Omega biology that was overlooked when society mostly consisted of paired couples and single Alpha harems. _
> 
> _ As Omegas can go into heat with a gap as short as five days, the majority of superfetal pregnancies produce healthy multiple births. It is only when a gap of four or more weeks occurs that complications can arise. Since most multiple births occur before 38 weeks this will put the younger offspring into the preterm birth category, which carries risk of underdeveloped respiratory, circulatory, digestive, and nervous systems. The wider the gap, the more severe these problems may become _ —

He powered off the pad and dropped it face down on the bed. After a second thought he placed a pillow on top of it as well. This was too big for him to face on his own.

Hux still had his back to him. 

Dopheld still couldn’t bring himself to raise the subject again.

* * *

At the very base of the cliff, built into the rock itself, was a row of ancient looking businesses—a shipwright; a mechanic; a fishmonger; a pawn shop; and half a dozen other eclectic stores. Each one had the air of having belonged to a single family for tens of generations, and of having been at war with its neighbours for just as long. 

“Technicians Wanted: Piecework Rates,” Dopheld read aloud as they strolled arm-in-arm along the narrow pavement. After eight hours working on the Orange Feline’s electronics it had seemed like a good idea to get some fresh sea air. 

Hux looked up, startled out of some deep thought. “What?” 

“There,” Dopheld pointed to the sign. “Technicians Wanted: Piecework Rates. Maybe we should have a look.”

They’d been in the hotel for five days now. It was much cheaper than Dopheld had expected, and it was nice to sleep in such a soft wide bed, but the ship was nearly finished—they would either need to leave at the end of the week or find a reason to stay.

“Hmmm… Looks like they've got a few crates of disassembled med droids, possibly mixed in with some MSE units,” Hux said after a few moments scanning the pallets stacked outside the business. “Actually I think there are some surgical stations in there too.”

“Do you think we can do it?” Dopheld asked. He liked it here, and the money would be welcome. “I’ve only worked with the mouse droids, but I can take direction.” 

He smiled to himself as a memory surfaced. There had been that one MSE droid that he’d programmed to hide candy inside its chassis, and then make covert delivery runs to the cadet barracks at night. That droid had almost been as popular as Stabby. What had they called it?

“Oh yes, I remember Batuu the Smuggler Mouse,” Hux laughed as if he’d read Dopheld’s mind. “I’m sure we’d be fine. Shall we speak to them?”

The owner of the business—which apparently specialised in second-hand medical and assistive technology—turned out to be a short purple Nautolan who was missing most of the tentacles from the left side of his head. A trio of much younger Nautolans watched them warily from a doorway behind him.

Dopheld had never encountered this species before, but looking into the being’s completely black eyes reminded him of speaking to stormtroopers. He couldn’t tell where they were looking as the Nautolan introduced himself as Fonre Vets. 

Hux gave their names as Max and Pheld Hitaka, and explained that they were newlyweds looking for work. Dopheld hoped Fonre would assume his blush of embarrassment was at the oversharing about their relationship rather than lingering discomfort at their new names. 

“I have a supplier bringing four pallets a week off the battlefield, in addition to the dozen we already have here.” Fonre said as he led them into the warehouse turned workshop that extended into the cliffs behind his storefront. “She has these scavenger droids set to find parts from a few specific units, but they aren’t programmed to repair them or organise them for completeness. For all I know I’ve got twenty crates of droid chassis and no circuits. But I don’t have time to sort through it all.”

He waved at a mountain of plasteel piled against the wall to nearly twice his height. 

Dopheld wouldn’t know where to begin, but he could see Hux was already making a plan of attack from the way he stalked through the mess with his hands clasped behind his back. 

“You’ll get paid for every crate you sort,” Fonre went on. “There’s bins back here for each unit type I’m expecting, plus one for miscellaneous. After that you’ll get paid for each complete unit. I don’t want to rip you off—as I said there might not be any complete sets in there—but if there are and you can put them together I’ll pay you for that too.”

Hux nodded thoughtfully. “Our best approach is probably to sort by type, and then quality. It'll be more efficient to find all the nearly-complete units and breakdown the partial ones to finish them off. Then see what scrap we have left.”

“Good!” Fonre smiled brightly at them, and held out a hand. 

Hux shook it, a little warily. 

“What are your hours here?” He asked. “So we can get the most work done.”

Dopheld tried to give him a look that would convey his opinion that Hux shouldn’t be pushing himself too hard, but Hux just pursed his lips like he was holding back an argument.

“We arrive and leave with the high tide, but either myself or my husband will always be here, so you can come and go as you please.” Fonre’s smile widened. “We know people who live above the waves tend to rise with the sun.”

Given past experience Dopheld would have said Hux was more inclined to go to bed when the rest of the universe was waking, and to only rise with vehement protests. However, he kept that opinion to himself—Hux did not look like he had a sense of humour today.

* * *

The civic crematorium seemed to have been designed as an exercise in non-expression. As a facility that was open to every species that passed through the spaceport it was intentionally inoffensive—no sombre colours to upset those who saw death as rebirth, none so bright that they would hurt those who grieved. A perfect middle ground.

What better exit point for a man who’d played both sides to the best of his abilities?

“Do you have any final words before we lay Donit Jo-In to rest?” The officiant asked Hux with the air of someone who could and probably did do his job in his sleep.

Dopheld had to bite his lip to keep himself from laughing at the name. The slicer had been carrying multiple IDs, but since they wanted to avoid him being traced Hux had registered his cremation under the words stamped on his hat. Both hat and IDs had long since vanished into the furnace at the workshop, so no one but them would ever know any differently.

“Everyday of your life was a gamble, but even the luckiest people have to lose in the end.” Hux said solemnly. “I hope you get the rest you deserve.”

Keeping his head down Dopheld nodded and tapped his chest once. It was the closest he could get to showing respect for a man who’d threatened his Mate and cost them most of a week’s wages.

Hux took his hand as the body rolled into the incinerator. 

They’d bought the cheapest possible option—no coffin, no memorial, and no remains. The city took the carbon and rare elements from relinquished ashes for use in manufacturing. If they were still in the city in a month or two they might walk by things made with the remains from today’s cremations.

If only they could so completely dispose of every person who had caused problems in their lives.

* * *

There was a very small Nautolan staring at him. 

He’d seen a few different members of that species around the warehouse over the last two weeks, but other than an occasional polite nod of greeting most of them ignored him and Hux. They were just manual labourers—there was no reason to address them if it wasn’t about their work. 

This particular Nautolan wasn’t addressing him though, it was just staring at him with its huge, glittering black eyes set in a pale green face. Based on its size and the stuffed fish held in its hands, Dopheld guessed it was a child. 

It was also absently sucking on one of its tentacles in the same way that a human child might suck their thumb. At the back of his mind he wondered if the babies Hux was carrying had started to do that yet…

The Nautolan blinked. 

He should probably say something.

“Hi there,” Dopheld tried with a gentle smile. “Are you okay?”

The Nautolan responded with a grin and a sound like rocks tumbling down a drain.

“Uh…”

“She can’t speak Basic yet,” another—slightly larger—Nautolan said as they appeared from under the workbench. “She’s only four. I’m seven so I can speak Basic real good!”

A third silently joined the group, their tentacles tangled with the second’s. Apparently number two was the ringleader of this little group.

“Oh. Could you tell me what she said, please?” Dopheld asked. He put down the MSE droid he’d been working on to give them his full attention.

If he was honest, he was finding the stares of six entirely black eyes a little unnerving, but he didn’t want to be unkind. They were only children after all.

“She said your head looks funny.” Number two said as he pointed at Dopheld. “What’s that stuff called?”

“My hair? Is that what you mean?” Dopheld lifted a strand that was longer than he’d ever let it grow before. 

“What’s it for?”

That was a question he’d never considered. “Uhhh it’s not really for anything? It keeps my ears warm, I guess.”

“Weird. We can feel if people are sad or happy with ours. And we don’t have fins on the side of our heads that get cold… that’s just silly. Anyway—I’m Pesha, this is my sister Rhi, and this one is my brother Yil,” Pesha said indicating number one and then number three in turn. “Who are you?” 

“I’m Pheld, I’m helping your…” he paused, suddenly aware that he didn’t actually know the relationship between these Nautolans and the owner, Fonre. “I’m helping to get these droid parts sorted and built.”

Yil yawned. “That’s boring.”

The other two nodded.

Dopheld shrugged, he couldn’t really argue with that point. “Sometimes you have to do boring jobs so you can feed your family.”

“You mean the other human with the… uh… human fry... inside him?” Pesha asked, stumbling over a phrase that didn’t seem to exist in his own language.

Dopheld laughed in surprise. “The human what?”

Pesha made a swimming motion with his hand. “Fry! Little humans! When they’re not in the egg any more, but they don’t have legs yet? He has some in his belly, Uncle Fonre told us!”

When had Hux told Fonre? And why? He couldn’t ask these children that, and Hux was somewhere deep in the warehouse looking for solder. He’d just have to wonder for now. They could have a proper conversation back at the ship. If either of them stayed awake long enough. 

“Oh, well,” he said, searching for a child friendly explanation. “We call those ‘babies’ and yes they are mine, but humans don’t like to talk about that until they’re older. It’s like a secret.”

“Aaaah,” Pesha said wisely, “Is that why they’re inside him instead of in the sea with the others?”

“Something like that,” Dopheld said, not wanting to get into the finer points of human reproduction with… well, anyone, ever.

“Okay, we can keep a secret, can’t we?” Pesha nudged his siblings.

“Yeah, if you make it worth our while,” Yil muttered.

Trying not to raise an eyebrow at the audacity of this child, Dopheld replied, “and what’s your price?”

Yil blinked rapidly. He clearly hadn’t expected that tactic to work. “I dunno… candy?”

Rhi made a noise.

“Yeah, that’s a good idea!” Pesha nodded, his tentacles bouncing with his enthusiasm. “We’ll help you with your boring job and keep your baby secret, if you get us candy! Ten pieces! Each!”

They wanted to help him? Dopheld looked around for an adult Nautolan to consult, but there was no one else here. At Pesha’s age he’d been able to put together a blaster and do basic maintenance jobs. And they were hanging around a workshop unsupervised, they were probably used to doing some kind of task.

He glanced at the stacks of circuits on the workbench. Those would be easy enough for them to help with—MSE droids only had about a dozen standard functions each indicated by the coloured band on the edge of the circuit. Rhi could sort them by colour, Yil could check for damage, and Pesha could remove the extra bolts. Those were all age appropriate tasks. 

“Okay, but you have to be careful,” he said before he walked each of them through their individual jobs. Once they were settled, he added. “Also, I can’t pay you until tomorrow—I don’t have any candy yet.”

“None at all?!” All three children looked scandalised.

“Nope.” Even if he had anything sweet on the Orange Feline he wanted to make sure it was safe for Nautolans before he brought it in.

Yil grabbed his hand and tugged him closer, like he was about to impart some vital knowledge. 

“You gotta promise me you’ll buy candy for your fry… I mean your babies.” He whispered seriously. “It’s important so they can grow up big and strong. Okay?”

Rhi warbled in agreement.

“Fine, I promise.” Dopheld nodded in a way that hopefully looked sincere. “Now, come sit up here and you can earn your own candy.”

* * *

He had no idea how long Hux had been standing there on the far side of the workbench, with that odd little half smile on his face. 

Dopheld had been too busy with his conversation to notice when he came into the room, and he didn’t really want to break the flow to ask. They’d almost cracked the problem at hand.

“Right so we’ve got twelve bolts,” he prompted, “but if we divide them in half we get?”

Yil’s tongue was blue where it peeked between his teeth in an expression of intense concentration. “Six.”

“And quarters?”

“A quarter is half of a half…” Metal rattled across the table top as Yil counted. “So that’s… three.”

“That’s right, and now we’ve got four sets of three. But how many are in a third of twelve?”

“Four!” Pesha said immediately, then blushed a deeper green. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay, Yil can you tell me what would be in a sixth of twelve?”

Yil grinned. “Two!”

“I hope you three aren’t distracting our new technicians!” Fonre said as he strode into the room, his remaining tentacles twisting a little as if testing the air.

Pesha and Yil both jumped down from the bench to hug their uncle’s legs. Rhi wriggled slightly where she’d curled up on the workbench for a nap, but she didn’t wake.

“Not at all, we’ve just been working on some mathematics since we’d finished with the MSE droids,” Dopheld said with a nervous smile. “I hope you don’t mind them helping me, you don’t need to pay for the last hour if it's a problem.”

“Oh no problem, I’m glad to see they were keeping busy.” Fonre said, lifting Rhi down to stand swaying sleepily next to her brothers. “Run along to your Uncle Virl now, it’s nearly hightide, you need to get to school.”

“Don’t forget you owe us candy, Uncle Pheld!!” Yil shouted back from the storefront.

Pesha joined in. “Tomorrow, remember! You promised!”

The door closed on whatever odd noise Rhi was trying to add to the chorus. 

Dopheld grimaced when he noticed Hux shaking his head where he was leaning against the workbench.

“Sorry,” he said to Fonre.

“Really, it’s fine. Thank you for being so patient with them.” Fonre replied, one hand awkwardly skittering over the ends of his missing tentacles. For a moment he seemed to glance down at Hux’s abdomen before intentionally looking away. “We don’t have fry of our own yet, and suddenly having three grown kids has been a bit of a shock. We don’t really know what to do with them.”

“Where are their parents?” Hux asked, though Dopheld assumed that like him Hux could probably guess the answer to that. Most people who were missing these days were gone for one reason.

“They used to fly support for shipping convoys, protecting goods from pirates and the First Order. When the call came from the Resistance about the threat on Exogol...” The helpless way the Nautolan shrugged said everything. “Part of salvaging from the ruins is about looking for the dead too. It’s important people know for sure who they lost.”

One of Hux’s hands skimmed down his front, the gesture almost too quick for Dopheld to notice. Almost, but not quite.

“Yes, that’s important,” Hux agreed.

“Did you lose someone in the war, Max?” Fonre asked. He seemed to glance between the two of them but it was hard to say for sure with his blank eyes.

“A lot of people. We were lucky we got out together. Pheld thought I was dead for a while.”

“Longest five minutes of my life,” Dopheld agreed.

The three of them stood in silence for awhile, each wrapped up in their own unhappy thoughts.

It was Hux that broke the pensive mood by suddenly stretching, one hand pressed against his lower back as the other almost brushed the low ceiling. For a second his stomach seemed much rounder than it really was, or perhaps Dopheld was only just noticing the change for the first time. 

“Sorry,” Hux yawned, “I think I’ve been on my feet too long. Pheld, have you finished with the mouse droids? I was just coming to say I’ve completed all the medical and surgical droids we can get out of the current parts.”

Dopheld nodded. “Yep, all done. All the operational circuits and loose parts are sorted ready for the next delivery.”

“Speaking of the next delivery, it’s going to be delayed,” Fonre said. “So, you’ve got the next four or five days free. I’ll send a ping to the Orange Feline once our freighter is in system.”

“We could go off world for a few days,” Hux said thoughtfully as he pulled on his long coat. “How does that sound, Pheld?”

“Well, I owe my workforce some candy tomorrow morning, but after that? Sure.”

* * *

They’d picked up dinner on the way home from a little hole-in-the-wall street food vendor. Cooking was the last thing either of them wanted to do after such a long shift, and it seemed that Hux had developed a taste for the odd dumplings common to this planet. 

Dopheld thought they tasted of absolutely nothing, but it didn’t matter what he thought. As long as Hux was eating, and throwing up less, that was more important. 

“Meow?!” Millicent leapt onto the counter to investigate the bags in his hand.

“Yes, yes, Miss Magnificent, don’t worry I got you a mild seamilk curry, as usual,” Dopheld laughed, while Hux shook his head in melodramatic despair. “You have to let me get it out of the bag though, you can’t eat th—stop eating the bag! Millicent! St—”

“Come here, baby girl,” Hux said. He absently placed a small bottle on the counter to free up his hands so he could grab the cat. “Don’t mind the mean Alpha, he’s going to get you your dinner soon, yes he is.”

“Mean?! I bought the food!” Dopheld replied, though he kept his tone just as teasing as Hux’s own. “You’d be eating rodents out of the trash if it wasn’t for me.”

Hux had Millicent cradled against his chest now, and there was definitely more of a bump to his middle than there had been before. Dopheld had to consciously stop himself from staring at it. 

Since they’d started working for Fonre they’d both been too tired to interact much outside of mealtimes, and while they’d still shared a bed Dopheld hadn’t seen Hux undressed since that first shower in the hotel. He loved wrapping his arm around Hux’s middle while they slept, but feeling wasn’t the same as seeing.

He wondered if it would be inappropriate to ask to see him now…

As he mechanically lifted the takeaway containers from their bags his eyes finally focused on the object Hux had left on the counter. 

A half full pill bottle, with the words ‘Omega Prenatal Supplements’ engraved down the side. 

“Daddy wouldn’t ever make you eat rodents,” Hux was still cooing to the cat while he awkwardly opened the container of seamilk curry. “And he won’t let Papa let you starve either. No, he won’t.”

With her fur fluffed to its most luxurious Millicent wriggled out his grasp, gifted both of them with a brief head bump and then set to the task of eating her food as noisily as possible. 

“Are you okay?”

“Hmm?” Dopheld blinked and looked at Hux. “What?”

Hux took a box out of his hand. Dopheld wasn’t sure how long he’d been holding it six inches off the countertop. Probably a while by the way Hux was frowning at him. 

He turned back to the bags, but they were empty already. His brain had stalled at the very end of his task.

He glanced at the bottle again. 

What did it mean?

“I thought you were falling asleep on your feet then,” Hux said. 

He walked around him, and just for a moment Dopheld could have sworn his stomach brushed against his back while no other part of his body made contact. 

Hux didn’t seem to notice. He continued with plating up both their meals as if nothing had happened, though from his perspective perhaps nothing had. If you got bigger just a little bit every day would you realise?

“Seriously, Pheld, are you alright?”

Apparently he’d been staring. Dopheld looked at the bottle again. 

“Oh.” Hux blushed, and picked it up. 

Instead of shoving it back in his pocket, or otherwise hiding it, Hux flipped the top and shook a pill into his hand before he returned it to the same place on the countertop.

“Is that why you went to that reproductive clinic?” Dopheld asked when Hux had swallowed the pill and picked up his plate without any further comment.

Hux nodded slowly. “I haven’t made a decision. But—”

He sighed and wiped at one eye with the heel of his hand, a dumpling still skewered on the fork balanced between his fingers.

“If I keep…  _ if  _ I keep them, I know I won’t be able to forgive myself if they come out like me. Especially yours. They’ll already be so small, I don’t want them to be weak too. Brendol—”

“Brendol was an idiot,” Dopheld said, unable to let Hux finish whatever the sentence was going to be. “You’re not weak. Hell, you’re the second tallest Omega I’ve ever met, and a thousand times cleverer.”

“He kept my mother half-starved. It took me a decade to recover from those first four years of my life, and if I keep these babies I refuse to go through the guilt he should have felt.” Hux snapped. As if to prove his point he shoved the whole dumpling into his mouth. 

Dopheld had never seen anyone chew so angrily before. He laughed, he couldn’t help it.

Hux glared at him. The expression was completely ruined by the fact that he wasn’t able to entirely close his mouth around the dough he was chewing.

The only way to stop the fit of giggling was for Dopheld to cover his face and turn away.

“Oh stars, I’m sorry, that was just…” He started laughing again, coughed, and bit his knuckles. Hux was going to kill him. “That was the most  _ you  _ thing I have ever witnessed. Honestly, only you would angrily eat carbs to spite a dead man.”

When he finally managed to look up without breaking into giggles again, he found Hux staring pensively at the pill bottle, one fingernail tracing the seam of the lid. 

Shame wiped away the humour of the situation. He shouldn’t be laughing at his Mate, no matter how silly he looked at the time. “Sorry, I know that’s not the only reason you’re eating. I know you’re taking those supplements for the right reasons, and it’s okay that you haven’t made your mind up yet—”

“I saw your research,” Hux said. Dopheld almost asked  _ which _ research since he’d been looking into more than one topic, but kept his mouth shut and waited for Hux to go on. “There are risks. When the babies are so far apart. Yours… might need extra care, if they make it at all. I—”

He swiped at his eye again. He wasn’t crying, but his eyes were glistening like it was only a matter of time.

“I don’t know if it’s too big a risk when  _ his  _ will probably be fine.” Hux’s hand hovered over his stomach but his fingers clenched before they made contact. “This feels like another layer of punishment from him. You were doing so well earlier, with those Nautolan kids, and I had this vision of you with ours but then I thought—What if it's only his and not yours? Is it fair to do that to you? Would you stay?”

Dopheld stepped forward to grab Hux’s hands, placing the fork carefully on the table before he pulled them close to his chest. 

“How many times do I have to tell that I don’t think of them that way? They’re yours.” Dopheld said gently, tipping his head down for a moment to kiss Hux’s knuckles. “When Pesha mentioned them I said they were mine without even thinking about it, because they’re yours and you are mine. If you keep them and only one of them makes it, I swear I’ll raise that one just the same. I appreciate what you’re doing to give them the best chance even though you’re not sure yet. I love you.”

Hux’s bottom lip trembled but before he could say anything else his stomach growled. 

He snorted, and the sad expression turned into something like a smile. “Fuck, I should just eat and stop being ridiculous. Everything they say about hormones is true. If anything, they’re understated. Sorry.”

“Eating sounds like a good idea,” Dopheld said, “As for the rest, I’ll take your word for it. Now, where do you want to go tomorrow?”

Hux looked relieved at the change of subject.

“I had an idea, but it’s a secret,” He said, his smile turning devious, “do you trust me?”

Dopheld snorted, “far more than I should given what I know of you!”

Finally the tension left the room with Hux’s delighted laughter. 

They ate for awhile in companionable silence—or as silent as it could be with Millicent loudly chewing. It was nice to sit together, and just exist. 

“Can I… can I see your uh…” Dopheld had thought he could take advantage of Hux’s mood improving, but as soon he began the sentence he realised he didn’t actually have the guts to go through with it. He had started to gesture towards Hux’s middle but he turned the movement into reaching for some condiments he didn’t really want instead. “Nevermind, sorry.”

Hux looked down at his bump, thoughtfully biting into another dumpling. He ran a hand over the curve of his belly as if he hadn’t noticed it before.

“I keep forgetting what I look like now. In my head I still have the waist I had when I graduated. No wonder Fonre asked about it. I didn’t say much, just assured him it wasn’t a liability. I guess he told the rest of his family if the kids mentioned it to you.” Hux sighed heavily through his nose and tugged his tunic down as best he could. He finished the dumpling and looked up at Dopheld like he’d forgotten what they were talking about. “Were you going to ask to see it? Without clothes?”

“Yes, please, if it's okay with you.” An edge of his old rank deference slipped into his voice and Dopheld felt his shoulders go up in embarrassment. Alphas didn’t talk like that. 

Hux bit his lip, his eyes drifting away to focus on a light across the room. 

“Not right now,” he said. Usually, Hux didn’t have a gentle tone but he managed a good approximation of one. “I need a shower and… you could say I need a run up to it. Perhaps, in the morning? If you go drop off that candy while I shower? I’d go in now but I think I’d fall asleep.”

“Of course, whatever you’re comfortable with.”

* * *

If Dopheld was being completely, 100% honest with himself, he didn’t entirely expect the Orange Feline to still be in the spaceport when he got back from his visit to the workshop. 

He felt like he’d overstepped the mark last night by asking too much of Hux. He knew Hux had his insecurities, and he knew that a decision still hadn’t been made. Seeing where their children were growing was so close to bonding with them. If Hux didn’t want them, there was no way he’d let Dopheld do that. 

The ship was exactly where he’d left it, with Millicent watching the world go by through the cockpit window above the poorly stencilled name he’d added to the side. 

Home.

He hopped up the ramp before it had fully opened, and hit the closure button as soon as it was safe. This ship was theirs and the rest of the galaxy had no business getting into it.

Hux was waiting for him in the refresher doorway, wearing nothing but leggings and a towel draped around his neck. 

A mess of emotions hit Dopheld so hard he almost fell as he stumbled to a halt.

There was no pretending Hux wasn’t pregnant now—he wasn’t even half way through his oldest pregnancy but there was already a very clear round bump sitting low towards his always prominent hip bones. A dark line of skin ran down through his belly button to vanish into the treasure trail of ginger hair curling over his waistband. The bruising of his ribs had mostly faded, though here and there were shadows where the extra weight pulled at the bones.

Hux glanced down at himself. His hands shifted as if he wanted to cover up, but instead he balled them into fists and straightened his back, fixing his gaze defiantly.

“Oh stars, look at you,” Dopheld sighed. He wanted to say more but he felt like he’d cry if he tried. 

From the way Hux’s cheeks and shoulders turned pink he’d said the words with all the reverential praise he’d hoped to convey. 

“Can I touch you?” He asked, stepping forward with his hands out to his sides like he was approaching a potentially dangerous animal. 

There was a moment where Hux’s lips settled into a sneer but he seemed to catch himself, and nodded. 

His belly was warm and firm and possibly the best thing Dopheld had ever felt in his life. He couldn’t feel anything moving—knew he wouldn’t be able to at only fourteen and nine weeks—but knowing that the potential was there… 

This was all pure Alpha thought. Something deep and primal that was almost like being drunk but entirely sincere at the same time. He wondered if Hux could smell the pride he was feeling right now, the affection that ran so deep it was a physical ache. 

He should have asked before he fell to his knees and pressed a cheek to Hux’s belly but he was entirely beyond words at that point. 

Honey, lemon, spices, fire—Hux smelled like heaven.

A cold hand ran through his hair, gently but with a purpose. 

“Pheld?” Hux murmured. “That’s enough.”

Dopheld scrambled to his feet, his face burning with embarrassment. He’d pushed too far again. He’d got carried away. That wasn’t fair to Hux. He shouldn’t have—

Cool lips met his own and dragged him back to reality.

“I have a departure window booked for fifteen minutes from now, and I’d quite like not to miss it,” Hux said. He patted Dopheld on the cheek and pushed past him towards the living quarters. “You can manhandle me any day of the week. It's only your birthday once a year.”

“It’s my birthday?” Dopheld asked a little stupidly. His brain was swimming in too many endorphins to keep up.

He glanced at his chronometer. 

It was in fact his birthday.

And there were twenty four days left before Hux had to make a decision.


	9. Chapter 9

Dopheld’s birthday surprise had been a picnic of sorts in the place they’d first kissed, all those years ago. 

Well, not the exact place—that ship had been destroyed in the same incident that crippled the Supremacy—but overlooking the same nebula. The stars hadn’t changed much since then.

Fortunately Hux had come to terms with his own cooking limitations over the last few weeks. He’d supplied them with a few pre-prepared meals from a restaurant Dopheld liked, and a bottle of Correlian brandy that they couldn’t share. That had felt strangest to Dopheld—as an officer Hux had always been the one with access to decent alcohol. A whole bottle to himself felt like an extravagance.

There had been even more of that extravance in the form of refitted jump seats in the cockpit that could be arranged for cuddling up together, plus a gift of robes in ‘river colours’ just like he’d suggested. Apparently Hux had bought them on the day they’d found out about the babies, but he had never found the right time to hand them over. 

Lounging in his own starship in comfortable clothes, with a glass of good brandy in his hand, a cat on his lap, and his pregnant Mate by his side—was this really the life of Dopheld Mitaka? 

If he’d known deserting would give him all this he might have run from the First Order sooner. 

A twinge of guilt at that thought, and the sound of Hux starting to snore, brought the scene closer to reality. 

Not everything was perfect.

It seemed that whenever Hux stopped moving or thinking for more than twenty minutes he fell asleep. Usually on Dopheld.

Growing twins was hard work of course, but if he was this tired now—how bad would the exhaustion be later? Dopheld really should do more to make sure Hux didn’t overwork himself. Assuming the whole situation didn’t end in four weeks. 

He reflexively raised the glass to his lips but it was empty.

When had that happened?

One handed—the other being trapped behind Hux—he awkwardly reached out for the bottle. Unscrewing the cap was easy enough, but when he tried to lift it away the cap slipped from his grasp and tumbled towards the floor.

He moved to catch it, knowing that he wouldn’t be fast enough or flexible enough to reach it in time—

The cap stopped, an inch off the deck.

Dopheld stared. 

The cap remained suspended in the air, turning slowly.

He looked around the cockpit. 

They were alone.

There was a gentle tinkling noise as the cap dropped that last inch to the deck. The sound was much quieter than it would have been if it had dropped from its original height, but it was still loud enough to rouse Hux slightly.

“Mfph?” 

Dopheld sat frozen for a moment as Hux sleepily burrowed his face into the collar of Dopheld’s robes.

What the frell just happened?

Millicent had dropped down from his knee and was sniffing around the other side of the cockpit with her tail held high. 

He should probably investigate, but not with Hux here. If he woke up he’d only panic again.

“Let’s get you to bed,” he murmured. 

Hux didn’t seem to wake properly as they stood. Instead he kept his face against Dopheld’s neck—an awkward position given their height differences—and allowed himself to be guided to their bunk. There was an inelegant moment while Dopheld maneuvered out of the outer robe that Hux refused to release, but he was soon curled up under their blankets with Dopheld’s robe pulled close to his face. 

It would have been a sweet image if Dopheld hadn’t been too worried to properly notice it.

Where should he start?

He checked the security footage—no one else had entered the ship since the last time he’d been onboard, and the bottle cap really had hung in the air for a second or two.

Not a hallucination then.

Checking that Hux was still sleeping soundly, Dopheld went into the cockpit and closed the blast door. Millicent looked up at him, but didn’t protest the change.

“Do you have Force powers?” He whispered to her quietly. He felt like a fool.

Apparently the feeling was mutual because the cat just started washing a back leg as if the question didn’t deserve a response.

Next he read the label on the bottle, just in case this was magically infused Correllian brandy. It was not. 

As far as he could tell the bottle cap didn’t contain any magnets or repulsor lifts or invisible protection systems. 

The food was something they’d both eaten at least half a dozen times during their stay in that town. They would have noticed before now if it had any strange effects. 

There was nothing different or new about the decking.

Dopheld decided that, since he was already sitting on the floor, he’d test the least likely option—that he had Force powers of his own. 

Taking another swig of brandy to calm his nerves, he placed the cap on the deck in front of him and stared at it.

Nothing happened.

What had Ren done that time he’d throttled him? Oh yes, the hand.

He reached out towards the bottle cap as hard as he could. 

All that happened was that his shoulder started to ache, and Millicent licked the tip of his index finger.

“Can you sit somewhere else please, Magnificent?” He asked.

She started to clean the other back leg. That was probably the best he was going to get without physically removing her from the room, and he didn’t want her to wake Hux up so he just accepted it. This whole thing was an exercise in stupidity anyway.

Perhaps closing his eyes would help. That had made firing a blaster easier when he was a child.

He closed his eyes, folded his hands in his lap, and concentrated hard on the bottle cap.

Nothing happened.

Nothing kept on happening.

Just when he was deciding to give up, he heard a rattling noise.

The bottle cap was moving—between Millicent’s paws.

“Oh for—”

‘You’re trying too hard.’

Dopheld shrieked in fright. The bottle cap flew off the floor, pinged against the main viewport, and rattled away to be lost amongst the various panels of the dashboard. Millicent mewed indignantly.

He knew that voice. Kylo Ren had just spoken to him. 

Except it hadn’t felt like sound. 

That was a strange thought to have in itself—how could you hear a voice without sound?

Millicent had jumped onto the pilot’s seat and was industriously batting the bottle cap back towards him. She didn’t seem to have heard anything unusual.

‘The Force isn’t a thought, it is a thing, a muscle you have to exercise if you want to use it,’ the not-quite-voice continued with a hint of amusement and patience that Dopheld would never have heard from Kylo Ren. ‘You can’t just think ‘move’ and have something move. Try again.’

“Who the fuck are you?” Dopheld hissed.

“Meow?” Millicent chirrupped as she settled in front of him. 

“Are you possessed?” He asked her.

He wasn’t sure if cats could roll their eyes but she certainly tried her best.

‘I am not the cat. I am one with the Force.’

“You’re not the Force!” Dopheld snapped. “If the Force could talk it wouldn’t be a lost art for vicious, mystic warlocks. Are you Kylo Ren?”

There was a feeling as if someone across the room had sighed. Not quite a breeze, but enough air movement to make Dopheld’s skin turn to gooseflesh.

Millicent turned to rub her head on something near the pilot’s chair.

‘Not anymore.’

Dopheld swallowed back the bile that was rising in his throat. “Ben then?”

If it were possible to feel someone across the room shrug then was what happened in response.

“Leave us alone.” He said as forcefully but as quietly as he could. He wanted to scream. He wanted to attack the air. Most of all he didn’t want to wake Hux. This was something Hux didn’t need to know about right now. 

‘You’re doing well.’ Probably-Ben said patiently. ‘Keeping them safe. Thank you.’

Despite the tone—and the thanks—the Alpha part of Dopheld’s brain couldn’t help but take those words as a threat. The last of the slight drunken warmth he’d got from the brandy burned away, leaving his stomach filled with an ice cold sickness.

“I won’t let you hurt them,” He tried to jump to his feet, forgetting where he was sitting within the cockpit—he gasped as he caught the back of his head and one shoulder on the edge of a display. 

For a moment he saw blue swirls in front of his eyes. By the time he could focus again, the odd atmosphere in the room had dissipated. 

Millicent was scratching at the doors. 

He picked up the cap, jammed it back onto the bottle, and headed towards the kitchenette. The cat dashed by him and into the refresher. Hux was still snoring softly.

Had any of that been real?

Dopheld shoved the brandy onto a high shelf, behind the glassware. About half the liquor was gone. 

After pouring most of a bottle of water down his throat he went to check the security camera again.

It was embarrassing to watch himself attempting to move the bottle cap with his mind. He looked like a child playing at being a Jedi.

There was no other voice on the recording.

The bottle cap had definitely flown across the room, but Millicent was positioned so he couldn’t see how it left the deck—perhaps she’d batted it away. 

He tried to tell himself that, but he didn’t believe it. 

Feeling horribly guilty, Dopheld erased the audio from the ten minutes after he took Hux to bed. If Hux bothered to scroll back that far he’d just tell him that he’d been playing with the cat.

He added ‘find out for sure if Kylo Ren is dead’ to the mental list of research he needed to do, and headed to bed. He didn’t sleep that night.

The next morning he blamed his lingering headache on the brandy, and tried to forget that he’d had an argument with a ghost.

* * *

“Are you going to the Zephyr Festival?” Pesha asked.

It was nearing high-tide, and Dopheld had managed to convince Hux to take a break from work to sit on the edge of the dock with their feet in the water. 

Over the last few weeks they’d used their time off planet to work on Dopheld’s unease with open spaces. On their last trip they’d stood together in the middle of the Great Grass Plains of Naboo until the sun rose. Now sitting here with the sea and the horizon in front of him felt almost comfortable—if he kept hold of Hux’s hand. 

There had been no more strange occurances, and no more floating objects. Dopheld put that down to the brandy. He didn’t believe himself, but if he tried hard enough maybe one day he would. 

“What is the Zephyr Festival?” Hux asked. He was watching Yil and Rhi swimming loops around each other in the water while they waited for their uncle to collect them.

“Every two years a wind comes from the…” Pesha looked up at the cliffs, then at his hands. “Is it the east or the west? I can’t remember, but that way, from the forest beyond the spaceport. It’s a long, long way away. Uncle Virl says it further than you can swim in a day, but on land.”

“Well, that wouldn’t be very far,” Hux laughed, “neither of us can swim!”

Rhi stopped so suddenly in the water that Yil swam into the back of her. 

“Not swim?” She warbled with her mouth under the water, looking horrified. Dopheld had thought that ‘being too young to speak Basic’ had meant that she wasn’t able to learn, but having seen her in the water recently he’d realised she simply hadn’t developed whatever let Nautolans speak on land. 

“How will you play with your fry once they come out?” Yil asked with a similar expression.

Hux shook his head, clearly regretting ever making the comment. “Humans don’t spend a lot of time in water.”

“Until I came here I don’t think I’d ever seen more than a glass of water up close,” Dopheld agreed. “Anyway, Pesha was telling us about this Festival?”

Pesha nodded enthusiastically, waving his hands as he explained. “So, the wind brings all these pretty flowers from the forest, and they land in the sea. That makes the fruit grow in the kelp fields.”

“A wind like a storm?” Hux asked.

“No, no it’s very gentle, like breathing.” He blew at them to emphasize his point. “The air over there is very warm, and the flowers look like jellyfish so when the wind blows at the right time it lifts them up.”

Hux frowned. “And then everyone has a party about it? Seems like an odd reason to me.”

“It’s a fertility festival,” Virl said as he strode down the dock towards them. Like his husband Virl was also purple, but taller, with tentacles so long he had to keep them curled to stop them dragging on the floor. He winked. “I guess you two don’t need to attend, but it’s always a fun party.”

“Hah,” Hux said flatly. He turned his face away so Dopheld couldn’t tell if he was angry or embarrassed. 

“What sort of thing do people do there?” Dopheld asked. He’d never heard of a community-wide fertility celebration. If the kids knew about it then it couldn’t be too obscene, surely?

“There are food stalls, singing, dancing, that kind of thing.” Virl said. “It’s traditional for the younger person to try to catch a flower the same colour as their lover’s scales or feathers and give it to them as a gift. That’s supposed to represent a promise of a fruitful marriage. I guess you’d have to try to match it to your head covers, I don’t think the flowers come in beige.”

“It’s called  _ hair _ !” Pesha said with the air of someone imparting ancient secrets. “Uncle Pheld told me that. It keeps their head fins warm.”

Even though he was still looking away, Hux laughed. That had to be a good sign.

* * *

Dopheld wasn’t sure he’d have been able to cope with the festival grounds even a week ago. They were on top of the highest cliffs to the south of the spaceport—open sky above, open sea below, the distant forests hidden by a colourful cloud that grew closer by the minute. 

At least Hux was by his side, holding his hand and keeping him grounded. 

There was a tension in Hux’s shoulders that Dopheld hadn’t seen recently. It reminded him of when they first escaped, or when they’d first found out about his condition. 

Perhaps it was just the crowds. Hux had redyed his hair that morning, and insisted that they both wear their most colourful robes. No one would ever recognise the former General in this blond, bearded Omega with his copper robes hanging elegantly around his bump. But he kept scanning the area as if he expected something all the same.

For Dopheld it felt almost like being in a community again, the way living in the First Order had done. He recognised people—food merchants, colleagues, folks who lived on similar schedules so they passed one another in the street. He didn’t know their names but he knew their faces, and that felt like enough for now.

Hux had bought them some kind of candied fruit on a stick to eat while they walked around, waiting for the ‘main event’. Given that this was the arrival of a specific wind, no one seemed to know when exactly this would occur, but they also didn’t seem to mind. 

People were singing, children were darting through the crowds, every so often groups would burst into apparently spontaneous dancing. 

“Are you happy, Pheld?” Hux suddenly asked without looking at him. “Working for Fonre? Wandering in the days inbetween?”

“If you’re with me I don’t care where I am,” Dopheld replied. The light behind them was changing, like the sun was suddenly shining through multicoloured glass, but he was too busy admiring the way it reflected on Hux’s hair too look at the source.

“Is that really enough?” Hux turned just his eyes to meet his gaze.

No question had ever been easier to answer. “Absolutely. But is it enough for you?”

Hux leaned down to kiss him. 

“You know,” he murmured, “I think it might be.”

Dopheld let his eyes flutter closed for a moment as he returned the kiss. When he opened them again there was something beautiful drifting by above them, the same shade of copper as Hux’s natural hair. It was a flower, about the size of his hand, amongst a plethora of flowers in a thousand different colours. 

The rest might as well have been invisible. 

He reached for that one perfect flower, but it was a good ten feet above him.

Something in him moved, like a muscle he didn’t know he had, and the flower changed directions in the air to land in his palm with a soft thwap. For a moment his heart soared with pride until he realised what he’d just done, or what he  _ thought _ he’d just done. Even now he couldn’t quite believe he’d used the Force for himself.

He glanced around guiltily, wondering how he’d explain what just happened to Hux, but Hux wasn’t looking. 

Hux had just grabbed a flower of his own from amongst the drifting blizzard. It was such a deep purple it was almost black. 

“I… uh…” Hux coughed and blushed. “I was going to say this whole event was nonsense, but this is so close to the colour your eyes would be on the—you know, at our old job,” he corrected, and Dopheld knew he meant on the bridge of the Finalizer, under the red and blue running lights. “That I guess I just  _ had _ to get it.”

Dopheld laughed and held out his flower, “Are you embarrassed about doing something romantic?”

“Not at all,” Hux lied as he presented his own. 

As if to ruin the moment, the chronometer in Dopheld’s pocket chimed.

Time was up. If Hux wasn’t going to keep the babies now was the time for them to go back to that medic before it was too late to do the procedure.

“Max—”

Hux stepped forward and pressed his flower down on top of Dopheld’s as he clasped his hand. Hold eye contact with him, Hux raised their linked hands to his lips. “Do me a favour, Pheld, and delete that timer.”

“Max, two months are almost up, we’ve got four days to get back there.” Dopheld wasn’t sure how Hux had known what the timer was for, but something in him had to say the words out loud.

“I know. Delete it.”

“Have you made a ch—”

“I said ‘delete it’, didn’t I?” Hux smiled a little as he repeated himself. “That’s not a date I need to track, let it go by without an ounce of notice from either of us.”

“You mean…” Dopheld didn’t want to let the hope get into his voice, not until he was certain. His heart was hammering in his chest.

“Are you really going to make me say it?” Hux asked quietly, pulling Dopheld closer so their hands were trapped between their chests, above where his belly sat warm and noticeably round where it pressed against Dopheld’s stomach. His smile turned teasing as he added, “Hmm, my Alpha?”

The warm zephyr wind ruffled their hair as they gazed at one another. Without really thinking about it Dopheld’s free hand came up to brush through blond locks that still glittered with the sunlight shining through the drifting rainbow flowers.

“I won’t make you, but it would mean the galaxy to me if you would.”

Hux breathed deep, and pressed their foreheads together as he closed his eyes. “Pheld, I believe you’re going to be the best father these children could ever ask for.”

“Thank you.” It wasn’t enough but it was all Dopheld could manage to say before he kissed Hux as hard as he dared.

All around them, other couples jumped for flowers and kissed as the rest of the crowd cheered them on. Neither of them noticed. 

* * *

Making the decision didn’t make Hux that much more inclined to discuss his pregnancies. For the most part life continued as it had been—they worked for Fonre sorting salvage, they shared a bed in the Orange Feline, and they left the planet whenever they had more than twenty hours free time. 

Space still felt most like home. 

If Dopheld spent a few minutes each night trying to move things with his mind, he made sure never to mention that fact to Hux. He never managed to do anything, so really there was no reason to bring it up.

Millicent occasionally paid attention to things that weren’t there, but she also started a fight with her reflection more than once.

As long as no one but Hux spoke to him on the ship, he wasn’t going to worry about it.

* * *

Dopheld stopped at the top of the stairs from the kitchenette, a mug of tea in each hand, to admire the sight of his Mate on this quiet morning.

Hux was lying on his back with his shirt pulled up and his eyes closed, one hand resting against the side of his bump as he breathed deeply. He would almost have looked like he was asleep if it weren’t for the crease between his eyebrows. Sleeping Hux only frowned when he had nightmares, and those had been few and far between since they’d joined Fonre’s company. 

It was difficult to dream through the exhaustion that followed a hard day’s work. Although Hux was doing his best not to push himself too hard, they both knew twins would be expensive—especially if they arrived early and the younger baby needed medical treatment.

This was their first week off in nearly a month. Dopheld was determined that Hux would get some rest.

Although he saw Hux in their bed every day, something about the scene this morning made Dopheld feel especially fond. At first he thought it was the way Millicent was rubbing her face against his bump, but after a moment he realised that Hux’s skin was moving, ever so slightly, and out of time with his breathing.

One of the babies was kicking hard enough to be felt from the outside.

In his chest Dopheld’s heart did a joyous little flip before plummeting into his feet when he realised that Hux hadn’t mentioned it to him.

As if hearing his thoughts Hux cracked an eyelid and stared blankly at him.

“You didn’t tell me they’d quickened,” Dopheld said quietly when it became clear Hux wasn’t going to speak first. He didn’t want to sound chiding, but he couldn’t quite keep the disappointment from his voice. 

They were twenty-four and nineteen weeks, they would have been moving for a while now if he’d thought about it. How long had Hux been keeping this from him? And why?

“I don’t know which one it is…” Hux said.

“Which one?” 

“Yours or… Ben’s…” the name wasn’t even a whisper. It was barely a movement of his lips but it felt like a stab wound.

“Why in the stars would that matter to me?” Dopheld asked, trying and failing to keep the offended pride from his voice as he stepped forward.

Hux turned his head to stare at the roof of the alcove above him. 

“I’m not Maratelle,” Dopheld said, invoking a name he’d rarely heard outside nightmare induced mutterings but knowing it’s meaning all the same. “Nor am I your father.”

Hux closed his eyes again.

Dopheld put their drinks down on a shelf to free his hands and stepped closer. Right now he wanted nothing more than to sit on the edge of the bunk to be close to Hux, but he knew there was a risk of making him feel trapped, and this shouldn’t become an argument.

“You’re mine, aren’t you?” He asked, reaching out a fingertip to gently trace the scar on Hux’s neck. He raised a hand to touch his own at the same time. 

Hux nodded and pressed his face to Dopheld’s wrist.

“Sorry, I’ve felt them moving for a while now,” He said. “When you got out of bed I realised I could feel them on the outside too. I wanted to share that, but then I over-thought it.”

Dopheld knelt, pressing his nose to Hux’s cheek, nuzzling the side of his face as best he could and ignoring the cold wet tears that had soaked into his beard. Hux would never forgive him if he realised he’d noticed that.

“They’re mine. Nothing will ever change that. I will always,  _ always  _ be there for them, and for you.” He paused to press a kiss to Hux’s lips. “You know, I was thinking—if you hadn’t broken your ribs we might never have known. If you’d never had that scan I mean. They’ll be born together and they won’t look that different—Kyl- _ Ben’s _ colouring is close enough to mine. We would just think one was smaller.”

“True,” Hux muttered.

“Whether you want them to know about Ben when they’re older or not, I intend to be the one who raises them. Because I love you. And I love them.” He said as he reached out a hand towards Hux’s bump. 

Hux caught his hand before he made contact. 

Dopheld had slept with an arm around that growing belly for weeks, so it hurt to be denied access now, but he’d had half a lifetime of letting Hux take the lead. He let his arm go limp.

With a slight smile Hux turned his face to nuzzle back, finally opening his eyes to meet Dopheld’s gaze properly. Whatever passed between them it felt like it took hours and less than a millisecond.

Hux moved his hand a few inches over from his first target and pressed it to the taut warm skin of his stomach.

A shape pressed into his palm for a moment, and then another harder contact. One of  _ their _ babies was kicking his hand.

“Oh, hello,” Dopheld gasped. He shuffled over a little to press his cheek against the underside of Hux’s bump. “Hi, are you okay in there?”

“Seriously?” Hux sounded miffed, but he didn’t make him move. 

“Yes, seriously, I read somewhere that it’s good for them to hear their other parent.” The light touches against his hand had increased, but he could only feel movement in that one spot.

Hux shifted. “Well, it’s not good for my bladder, you’ve definitely woken both of them up. It’s a damn good thing I love you, Pheld.” 

“You can feel them both?” Dopheld asked, a little sadly. He ran his other hand along the opposite side of his bump, but nothing felt different there.

“Yes, I most definitely can… nope, move,  _ move, _ ” Hux hissed the last word, all but kicking Dopheld out of the way as he wriggled off the bed and hurried towards the refresher.

“Sorry,” He mumbled, trying to hide his happy grin until the door closed. His babies were healthy and moving, and Hux loved him.

He reached for his tea, which slapped into his hand despite being three feet further away than he’d expected. 

How the fuck had he done that after so many weeks of failure?

As he stared at his hand he thought back to the previous incidents—now, and when he grabbed that flower he’d been happy. During the bottle cap incident he’d been content if not joyfully happy, and possibly a bit drunk. When he saw the writing that vanished he’d been worried about Hux. 

There was another time, wasn’t there? When he’d seen something or someone blue? He hated that he couldn’t remember what it was… the more he tried to focus on it right this moment the clearer it seemed to become. 

He’d seen Kylo Ren in their living quarters immediately after he’d bonded with Hux, one of the happiest moments of his life.

How the hell had he forgotten that?

From the cockpit something beeped, then a warning siren began to sound.

“Pheld, what the frell is that?” Hux asked as he slammed back out of the refresher. Dopheld was already on his feet and running to the controls.

The proximity sensors were going nuts. Below them a screen he’d never seen active before bore the flashing message— 

‘Warning: Missile Lock Imminent. Automatic Evasive Manoeuvres’

“Something is trying to fire on us!” He couldn’t see anything out of the viewport, and he didn’t know how to read the information scrolling by on the other screens. He wasn’t a combat pilot, and the Orange Feline didn’t have the sort of weapons he was used to operating.

A cold hand shoved him hard in the chest. He almost resisted until he realised Hux was pushing him into the jump seat.

“Buckle up,” Hux said sternly, then shouted over his shoulder, “Millie, get somewhere safe.”

Whether Millicent understood the command Dopheld couldn’t say, but he obeyed before he’d even processed the words, his eyes fixed on Hux as he fastened his own harness. At least the six point pilot’s restraints wouldn’t put any pressure on his stomach.

Something bright shot past the viewports, briefly illuminating the cockpit. Turbolaser fire.

“Pirates,” Hux hissed. 

“You’re sure?” Dopheld didn’t know why he’d bothered to ask. As the Orange Feline turned he saw the ramshackled vessel that was trying to shoot them down. No self respecting military would bother with a ship like that.

Self respecting or not, the next shot glanced off their rear.

Hux swore under his breath.

“The fucking power connection to the motivator is fried,” he gasped, his hands flying across the controls as he tried to get the hyperdrive to respond. “We can’t jump without it.”

“Can we reroute the power?”

“Not easily! I’d have to do it and right now I’m keeping us from getting blown out of the sky so…”

What Dopheld had thought was a blue nebula hanging in space in the far distance suddenly resolved into a transparent hand moving only inches away from his face. As he watched, it reached for a panel to his left and then passed  _ through  _ the plasteel surface. 

Sparks showered down from the entire control panel beside him, singeing his face and burning small holes in his shirt. 

“What the fu—”

Hux didn’t manage to finish the question before they were pressed back into their seats by the sudden acceleration. From the cargohold Millicent shrieked and then began a series of meowing complaints that Dopheld recognised as fear rather than pain.

The stars stretched as they flew past the windows, their transformation into the safety of hyperspace accompanied by more frantic swear words from the pilot.

Dopheld clung to the arms of the jump seat, trying not to lose control of his stomach or close his eyes in fright.

“What the frell did you do?” Hux asked in marginally calmer tones. Whether a minute or a millennium had passed Dopheld couldn’t say.

He opened his mouth to say ‘it wasn’t me’ but something in him halted that instinct. “I just went to open the panel and all those sparks flew out,” he said instead. “The wiring must have been loose.” 

Hux frowned, his eyes passing over the burnt out panel beside Dopheld and down to the indents he’d made in the chair with his terrified fingers.

“Well, I guess we’ll have to deal with that once we drop out of hyperspace again.” Hux sighed. “I’m not entirely sure where I sent us. I just input the first coordinates that came to mind, and now this screen is fried too.”


	10. Chapter 10

“Oh,” Hux said flatly when The Orange Feline dropped inelegantly out of hyperspace. It was a strange noise, neither surprised nor upset. Had it been said to a person there would have been an unspoken ‘it’s  _ you _ ’ at the end.

To Dopheld’s eye the planet below initially looked like a featureless pale grey sphere, but as he became attuned to the lack of colour he realised there were storm systems roiling across its atmosphere. Here and there lightning crackled between cloud banks, or illuminated them from within. 

Their angle of approach gradually revealed areas of grey sea that reflected the nearby star, and occasional patches of pale purple that might have been mountains. There was nothing recognisable about the topography that might jog Dopheld’s limited planetary knowledge. 

He looked at Hux for information. His Mate’s knuckles were white on the controls.

A crackle of unintelligible static over the comms might have been local traffic control.

“How are the stabilisers looking?” Hux asked with unconvincing calm. The ship was dropping into a steep orbit, apparently of its own volition.

Dopheld poked the necessary read outs. “They’re fine. So is the landing gear and the forward shield. Will we be landing or crashing?”

“Hopefully landing. The starboard engine didn’t appreciate that jump. It should get us to the ground, but I daren’t risk anything more than that.”

“Were we followed?”

“I think those pirates just took a couple of potshots at us out of habit rather than actual need.” Hux said. “I didn’t see any activity from their engines.”

“Good.” Dopheld keep an eye on the proximity sensor read out all the same.

He still wasn’t entirely used to the new sensor controls that Hux had installed to replace the old—apparently haunted—system. As far as he could tell Hux was right and space behind them was empty, but then so was most of the space in front of them. 

The planet had very little traffic for an inhabited world. 

He reassessed that thought when a station briefly appeared on the horizon—there was a significant number of ships moving in its vicinity, but still nowhere near a normal amount everywhere else. Sadly the station vanished again as they dropped into the upper atmosphere. It seemed that Hux was right about how far the engines would get them.

“Millie?” Hux called over his shoulder. “Come up here and sit with Pheld. It’s going to get rough.”

In a rare showing of obedience the cat trotted into the cockpit almost immediately. Judging by the state of her fur she hadn’t had a good time in the cargo hold.

“How rough?” Dopheld asked as he scooped her up against his chest.

The look Hux shot his way wasn’t encouraging. “It’s Arkanis at the height of spring. We might be lucky, or it might be like trying to fly into the sea. I haven’t been here in thirty years, but horizontal rain isn’t something you forget easily.”

Millicent mewed low in her throat. It didn’t matter whether she was responding to Hux’s words or his tone—Dopheld absolutely agreed with her.

“You’re right, Magnificent, I’ve got a bad feeling about this too.”

Dopheld thought he heard a deep chuckle from the other side of the cockpit, but he didn’t have time to think about it. 

A nearby flash of lightning filled the viewports with blue light that reflected off the dials for a single blinding moment, and then a second lit up the landscape beneath them.

The only hints that the rolling grey-purple hills below them was land instead of another cloudbank were the shapes of an occasional wind sculpted tree, and a set of rectangular outlines a mile or two to their left. 

“Brace!” Hux hissed.

Lumps of something grey, purple, and almost-green sprayed across the viewports for a second or two before the landing gear finally caught ground. At the same moment Dopheld caught his head against the broken panel beside him.

* * *

Based on the way the mud was still slowly sliding off the viewports Dopheld felt sure he hadn’t been out for long. Perhaps only a second or two. His neck hurt more than his head, but the way his vision clouded each time he blinked was reassuring. 

“Mew?” Millicent touched her chilly nose to his, her irises widening with concern.

“I’m okay,” he mumbled thickly.

As he turned his head to look at Hux bright dots flashed in front of his eyes for a moment, then coalesced into the lights of the control panels and the soft blue glow of a man crouching in front of Hux.

Dopheld blinked. Nothing about the scene changed.

The man had his torso wrapped over Hux’s bump, his head resting against his chest, and his hands braced to the sides of the pilot’s chair. He looked like he’d been shielding Hux’s stomach from the impact. Even though he was facing away from Dopheld it was easy to tell from his build that this was Kylo Ren. 

For some reason there was a small hole burnt through the back of Kylo’s shirt. Of all the details for Dopheld’s concussed brain to focus on, that was the one that most drew his attention. He wondered how it had got there. 

Hux’s hand passed  _ through _ Kylo’s torso as he pressed one of his own hands to the top of his stomach with a small hiss of pain. 

“Are you okay in there?” Hux whispered.

After a tense moment Kylo moved one of his hands to the side of Hux’s bump. One finger moved as if it pressed through his flesh. Whatever he’d done, it made Hux give a slight sigh of relief and slide his hand lower. Kylo’s hand followed.

“Oh, good,” Hux said, tipping his head back against the chair and closing his eyes. “They’re both moving.” There was an edge of pain to his voice that Dopheld really didn’t like.

“You think they’re all okay?” Dopheld asked. He emphasised the word ‘all’ in the hope that Kylo would recognise the question was actually addressed to him. 

While Hux said, “I’m not a medic, I don’t know,” Kylo turned his face towards Dopheld and pointed at the place where the harness crossed Hux’s chest. It was hard to read his expression, but he seemed concerned.

“How are you?”

“I’m fine,” Hux said so fast that his words drowned out the end of Dopheld’s question. His eyes stayed shut.

“Liar. Do your ribs hurt?”

“Only when I breathe.” 

“Fuck,” Dopheld sighed. 

He lifted Millie off his chest so he could release his own harness and put her on the floor. The movement brought back the bright lights, and apparently erased the image of Kylo Ren. A tiny, jealous Alpha part of his brain crowed about that fact, but the rest of his mind drowned out that voice with worry and a pounding headache. 

“How bad is it?” He asked as he stumbled across the cockpit and knelt in the space Kylo had been occupying. The steering column immediately wedged itself into his back. Clearly, being ethereal had its benefits. 

His hands were shaking a little as he unfastened Hux’s harness, but Hux either didn’t notice or was too polite to comment on it.

“Not as bad as when Pryde shot me,” Hux said. “It’s only the lower ones that hurt, I think the babies are pushing up where the harness pushed down.”

Dopheld eased Hux’s shirt out of the way, his imagination presenting him with all kinds of horrible images, but there were no marks on his skin beyond a pressure outline where the harnesses had been. 

“I’m going to try to listen to you breathing, okay?” He said in warning, and pressed his face to Hux’s side.

Hux jolted. “Why is your face wet—oh stars, Pheld what happened to your head?! You’re bleeding!”

“Stay still. You know head wounds, they always look worse than they are,” Dopheld said as lightly as he could. When Hux tried to pull on his hair to make him look up, he twined their fingers together instead. “Seriously, I’m only going to smear more blood on you if you don’t cooperate.  _ Sit still. _ ”

Hux froze as if an order had been barked at him by a parade ground sergeant. 

Even to Dopheld’s ears his voice didn’t sound entirely like his own. Perhaps seeing his Omega in pain was bringing out the Alpha in him even more. Not that Hux usually responded to things like that. Maybe it was hormones.

Or ‘mind tricks’. Could someone do a thing like that without thinking? Kylo Ren had often seemed incapable of thought, so maybe? 

Now wasn’t the time to be worrying about that though.

“Breath in… and out…” He couldn’t hear bubbling or anything else concerning there. He turned to press his head to the other side of Hux’s chest, grimacing at the now sticky blood he was leaving in his wake. “And again… sounds fine to me. We should probably try to get you checked out if we can though.”

“Okay, can you stop wiping blood on me and actually let me look at you now?” Hux said. 

There was irritation in his voice but Dopheld recognised and appreciated the tone of Hux trying to keep himself under control. 

He looked up obediently.

Hux’s face twisted in a way Dopheld couldn’t read. “Pfassk.” 

It took him a moment to realise that the tugging on his fingers was Hux trying to get his hands back. 

“Sorry,” He murmured and dropped his hands to rest on Hux’s knees. As if moving entirely under their own volition they slid up to frame the sides of his bump instead. One of the babies kicked lightly against his palm. 

The contact was a nice distraction from the pain of Hux’s cold fingers running over his scalp and forehead. 

“You’ve got a sliver of plasteel in here,” Hux said at last, “I’ll have to remove it and then glue the wound. Once it’s cleaned up.”

“Do you think the shower still works?”

Hux shook his head. “It’d probably be easier to stand outside for thirty seconds. It’ll take a while to check everything—I don’t want to strain any systems without good reason. Repairs will be expensive enough as it stands.”

“I suppose we’ll have to wait for daylight to run checks too,” Dopheld said morosely. He’d sat up to look out of the viewports again, forgetting that the steering column was so close behind him. The dark landscape outside was still hidden by the rain.

“That is daylight.”

“Fuck.”

“Yep.”

“And rain is going to be cold, isn’t it?” 

The question was more of a rhetorical complaint as Hux turned the pilot’s chair to stand, but Hux paused to kiss as blood-free part of his forehead anyway. 

“We won’t need to be out there for long,” Hux said, “and I’m sure we can warm each other up once we’re back inside.”

* * *

The rain was indeed cold, but since there wasn’t much daylight left they’d dealt with Dopheld’s wound and quickly retreated to the warmth of their bed until morning.

Dopheld wasn’t entirely sure the space could still be called a ‘bed’ anymore. It was starting to take on some nest-like aspects.

When Hux had been replacing the proximity systems he’d also taken the time to add extra padded panels to the edges of the alcove. These served to both extend the sleeping area and partially enclose it. Cushions had gradually appeared along with blankets and one of Dopheld’s shirts. 

Okay, it was definitely a nest.

Dopheld wasn’t going to call it that anywhere in Hux’s hearing though.

Hux never mentioned the changes, so Dopheld didn’t feel the need to raise them himself—if he  _ had _ to know something Hux would tell him. For now he appreciated waking up feeling so safe and toasty.

He would have especially appreciated it now, when Hux had sent him out into the rain in an attempt to work out exactly where they were. 

The ground under his feet squished and squelched. Small unidentifiable things scurried around beneath the horrible scratchy plants that Hux had told him was called ‘heather’. More than once he found a hidden stream by sinking up to the knee in the water. 

There was nothing much of interest to see in this landscape of flat moors split by sudden ravines. At least it had a ‘roof’ in the form of a never ending cloudbank. Sometimes the sky seemed almost close enough to touch, but occasionally he was walking through mist dense enough that he could wave his hand and leave patterns in the air. 

Anything was better than a wide open blue sky, though he might appreciate the heat of Jakku better now that he was truly frozen to the bone by the rain.

What had the sky been like on Jakku? He couldn’t remember. Every memory of Jakku was either staring at the sand or watching Hux’s face for any sign that Pryde’s shot had hurt him more than they realised. 

Apparently fear made him both brave and oblivious. 

He’d have quite liked not to notice the rain right now, but with Hux waiting back at the ship he also didn’t want to worry about his Mate’s health.

“If you can hear me,” he whispered to the rain and the theoretical ghost of Kylo Ren. “If you’re real and I’m not going mad—stay with him please? Keep them all safe.”

There was absolutely no response. Dopheld trudged on, feeling like a fool.

* * *

Millicent trotted eagerly over to greet him at the door, but withdrew with an offended meow when his coat showered water over her head.

She retreated to a bunk where she could both glare and groom herself back to perfection.

Somehow her expression was one he’d seen on Hux’s face, more than once. 

The man in question was waiting in the cockpit. He’d clearly just placed his blaster back onto the dashboard. One hand still hovered by the door controls.

“We’re safe, it’s just me.” Dopheld said.

“Report.”

Dopheld wished he still had his uniform cap to fidget with while he spoke. He felt like he was about to receive a dressing down from his General, something that had never actually happened, but that had always been a possibility. 

Hux sat in the pilot’s seat, both feet firmly planted on the deck and his back ramrod straight, staring with the intensity of a man arranging every piece of data onto a mental map. Only the plainness of his clothes and the swell of his belly gave away the scene. 

“We’re technically inside the old Imperial Academy grounds.” Dopheld began. “Most of the buildings were razed during the rout—the regular shapes that we saw from the air are what remains of the foundations and basements. Other than that there’s not much around here.”

Hux raised an eyebrow at that but didn’t interrupt.

“Apparently the settlement that served the Academy was abandoned pretty quickly.” Dopheld gestured south east. “Those who sympathised with the Empire left in the evacuation, everyone else returned home. The only inhabited building within a day's walk is an inn about two kilometres south of here. It's called ‘Red Sky In Mourning’. I spoke to the barman. The building serves a road nearby is often used for ground travel between two distant towns. We may be able to get the parts we need there. One has a spaceport, the other has a harbour. The same atmospheric issues we encountered make air travel prohibitively expensive. Major cargo is moved via sub-orbital spaceflight, anything else is ground based. I understand that many people walk. This is not a rich planet.”

“Or a pleasant one for hiking,” Hux said wryly as he glanced at the rain still lashing against the viewports. “I believe it rains here at least 85% of the time.”

Dopheld looked pointedly down at the puddle forming around his feet. “I can believe that.”

“You’re very late,” there wasn’t much sympathy in Hux’s voice.

“I’m not used to difficult terrain. Decks rarely go ‘squish’ when you step on them.”

Hux tipped his head in a way that said ‘good point’ though the words themselves never left his mouth.

“The good news is that the shower is working,” he said by way of apology. “I’ll make some tea and we can sort out a plan.”

“Thank you,” Dopheld murmured as Hux followed him into the refresher and started peeling away his wet clothes. “The barman said the First Order never came back here, so there shouldn’t be an risk of being recognised. I was worried because of the link to your… to Brendol, but…”

He paused awkwardly. Hux didn’t say anything to fill the silence.

Dopheld changed the subject slightly. “Apparently the owner of the inn is due back in a few days—she’s been on some kind of mission or pilgrimage—and she’ll be bringing a new medic droid with her. If your ribs are still bothering you then we might be able to get them treated.”

“Good idea,” Hux said vaguely, but he wasn’t really listening.

* * *

By the time they went to bed, the ‘plan’ had progressed to a mishmash of intentions glued together with assumptions and hope. 

They needed parts.

They would probably need food. 

The inn could supply the latter and hopefully provide at least directions to the former. So they were going to—very carefully—trek to the inn the next day, with a detour via the Academy ruins in case there was anything there worth scavenging. Weeks of working for Fonre had given them plenty of experience in that regard, even if the pickings were likely to be slim.

Whatever happened after that they’d have to wing it. 

Millicent would be coming with them, probably riding around someone’s neck most of the time, since they couldn’t guess how long they’d be away. 

Tonight might be the last time they slept in comfort for a while.

Therefore Dopheld was going to make the most of his available snuggling time by wrapping himself firmly around Hux where he could hold him and talk to his bump at the same time.

So far Hux was tolerating this with admirable restraint, and sometimes even absentmindedly stroking his hair in time with his breathing.

“Come on baby, aren’t you going to kick my hand? Show me you’re as strong as your sibling?” Dopheld said softly as he ran his hand along the underside of Hux’s belly—which was where Hux thought his child was growing while the older baby was growing in the upper half of his bump.

“They’re kicking plenty,” Hux replied with a half-laugh. “It’s just my bladder is in the way.”

“Sorry.”

From under a blanket by Dopheld’s shoulder Millicent made a disgruntled noise. Apparently they were being too loud.

“You know, we should consider names at some point,” Hux said quietly. “We can’t keep calling them both ‘baby’ forever.”

“Well, I was always told it was bad luck to give a baby a permanent name before they were born.”

“In case death comes for them?” Hux asked somberly. “I remember my mother saying that, though I don’t recall the context, she said nicknames were okay because that could belong to anyone.”

“No, my father said it was unlucky because fate would make the child come out the exact opposite of whatever the name meant. But that might have just been a dig at his brother Beau.”

Hux laughed. Millicent mewed, louder this time.

“Baby One and Baby Two?” Dopheld suggested after a moment’s thought. “Baby A and Baby B? Top Baby and Bottom Ba… No, that won’t work.”

Hux flicked the edge of Dopheld’s ear. “That sounds like we’re ranking our offspring. And I refuse to even acknowledge that last suggestion.”

“Hmmmm…” Dopheld hummed thoughtfully. Against his cheek one of the babies wriggled. “Oh, you like that?” He hummed a tune, more wriggling followed.

“Pheld, that’s the Imperial Anthem…” Hux said. He shifted uncomfortably. “That’s enough now.”

“Sorry.”

Hux started stroking his hair again and went on, “even if we don’t pick any permanent names now, it might be a good idea to have some parameters while we’re thinking about them. For example—I want to veto vowel names. No Enric, or Orson, or Edrison, and definitely no Armitage. I don’t know what my mother was thinking but anything has to be better than that.”

Dopheld nodded. “We should probably say ‘no one we served with’ to be honest. Though I’m not sure I know that many other names that aren’t associated with the military in some way or other.”

“Yes, that sounds like a good idea,” Hux said, then coughed awkwardly. “No offence to your name but I don’t believe in naming children for parents, I think a child should have their own identity.”

That seemed entirely logical to Dopheld, and it also meant that he didn’t have to veto Ben or Kylo himself. Although, Hux’s words did give him an idea...

He snorted in amusement at his own thought.

Millicent suddenly shoved her head out from under the blanket and meowed very loudly indeed. 

Hux moved his hand over to petting her instead.

“How would you feel about a name  _ inspired  _ by a parent’s name?” Dopheld asked.

“What do you mean?”

Dopheld snuggled down closer to Hux’s bump. “Well, if you’re going to be Max Hitaka for the rest of our lives, shouldn’t we call them Med and Min? You know—Medium and Minimum Hitaka.”

“Fucking hell, Pheld.” Hux sighed in irritation as Dopheld laughed. “How long have you been working on that joke?”

Dopheld was too busy giggling to answer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shorter chapter than usual, but its my birthday somewhere on the planet and I wanted to give you some fluff so...


	11. Chapter 11

“I was born here,” Hux murmured as they picked their way through the shell of what might once have been a kitchen complex.

“I know,” Dopheld replied. He was whispering. It didn’t seem right to speak loudly here. “You’ve told me that before.”

The ruins of the Arkanis academy had been stripped bare years ago. In many places the walls had been flattened to little more than trip hazards amongst the leaf mould blown across oddly resistant floors. Whatever was left standing wasn’t worth the effort of removing.

Electronics, pipes, and even windows had been torn out of every exposed surface. Plant roots used the grooves that had once held wiring to gain what small advantage the remains of the walls could give them. Birds now nested where control panels had once operated long gone doors. 

Even the shattered TIE fighters scattered across the grounds had been gutted where they lay so that only the wing frames remained, wrapped in crawling plant life until they looked like oddly geometric trees.

“No,” Hux said, one hand resting on the plasteel frame of a cabinet. “I meant that I’m almost certain I was born in this room.”

Glancing around Dopheld wasn’t sure how Hux could tell. The indoor spaces were barely more recognisable than the skeleton ships outside. It was only the profusion of broken pots and pans amongst the rubbish that made Dopheld think they were near the kitchens.

Crossing to where Hux stood, Dopheld saw the outline of what would have been a sleep alcove, with a cabinet at one end and a chest of drawers at the other. 

There had been thousands of those units manufactured for Imperial operations. His own family’s shared quarters had included something very similar. 

“She said I slept in a drawer for six months, because I was small and she didn’t have the funds for a crib that wouldn’t be used for long anyway,” Hux went on, mostly to himself.

He turned and stepped awkwardly over a broken wall panel to kick at some of the mess in the next room. 

“Look.” Hux pointed to a tall door, the hinges broken as if it had been torn off something. 

Letters had been scratched into the plasteel surface, every line repeated so often it was barely legible. 

“Armin?” Dopheld asked with a frown.

Hux glared at him. “That’s an Esk, not a Nern. I was three and it was dark in there. My mother used to have me hide in that cupboard whenever Brendol turned up drunk.”

“Sorry. The shape of the letters is pretty similar.” Dopheld said, climbing over the section of wall to hug Hux from behind. His face was shifting to that odd look he used to wear when he was hurting but not willing to acknowledge it. “I’m sorry you had to do that.”

Hux shrugged, but he didn’t push Dopheld away. Instead he linked his fingers with Dopheld’s own where they were resting on his hips and moved them up to his bump instead.

The gesture was appreciated even if Dopheld couldn’t feel anything much through the multiple layers Hux was wearing against the rain.

“She sent me down here when the fighting started. I don’t recall anything about that moment but the blaster in her hand. It was an S-195 and I thought ‘you had a blaster all this time but you never shot Brendol?’ I don’t remember her voice or the last words she said to me, all I remember is wondering why she didn’t stop him before. Half an hour later he tore the door off its hinges and dragged me out to a ship so fast my feet didn’t touch the ground.”

By the time Hux had stopped speaking his grip on Dopheld’s fingers was tight enough to hurt.

“I’m sorry.”

“I killed him,” Hux said hollowly. “In the end. I don’t know if she’d have been happy about that. I made a lot of the same mistakes she made, when the time came for it.”

He meant Kylo, but that wasn’t a ghost of the past that Dopheld wanted to encourage right this moment. Literally. 

“She’d be happy you’re alive.” Dopheld replied, leaning in to kiss Hux’s claim mark and forgetting that Millicent was currently asleep across shoulders.

At least the disgruntled murr of a cat being kissed on the hip made Hux chuckle. As long as he could cheer Hux up, he didn’t much care how he did it. Though he would have preferred not to have cat hair in his mouth.

“She’d be glad I’ve found a Mate who takes such good care of me… and my cat.” Hux laughed. He turned away from the scene to face Dopheld. “Come on, this place is nothing but a graveyard. I don’t want to think about the dead anymore. We’re alive, we need to stay that way.”

* * *

Despite the approaching twilight, the crimson dawn painted on the sign outside the Red Sky in Mourning Inn was so bright it almost seemed to glow. It was the only real splash of colour they’re seen since they left their ship, and possibly the most welcome sight Dopheld had ever seen in his life.

“Does the sun ever get that bright here?” He asked conversationally as he helped Hux across yet another half-hidden stream. “The most I’ve seen between the clouds so far is a sort of sickly beige.”

Hux grunted, but didn’t reply. He’d stopped responding much—beyond muttering ‘we’re fine’—to Dopheld’s attempts at positive chatter a few hours ago. 

Hiking in endless rain with a pregnant Mate would have been a bad choice even without the problem ribs and old thigh injury. There was simply nowhere in that horrible rocky moorland for them to rest.

Dopheld knew there was going to be a lot of self-loathing from his inner-Alpha once he finally had Hux settled somewhere, but until then they just had to power through.

The barman must have seen them coming, or perhaps there was a sensor system out on the moors that Dopheld hadn’t noticed. Either way he was glad to see the tall lanky shape of the Duros leaning in the doorway, well back from the rain.

“Good evening, Traveller,” Dopheld called, still trying to fake some kind of good cheer. “I hope you’ve got some space for us.”

“Aye, though if your Mate is going to lay his clutch tonight we might be hard pressed for nesting materials.”

“I’ve got at least sixteen weeks of this left,” Hux muttered through gritted teeth. “I intend to be off this planet in four.”

“I said the same thing, oh, eight years ago now? Sometimes we get tied down when we least expect it,” The Duros laughed lightly. He stepped back as they crossed the yard, holding open the door with his back.

“Then why are you called Traveller, instead of Loiterer?” Another voice asked from the shadows inside. 

Traveller made a rude gesture over his shoulder. “Ignore her, I think her circuits got wet again. At least the fire should be warm enough to dry everyone out.”

Despite Dopheld warning him in advance, Hux still flinched once he noticed the outline of the KX-series droid behind the bar. Given her black bodywork, and the dim light from the fire, it took him a moment or two to spot her. Dopheld himself hadn’t noticed her until half an hour into his first visit. 

“Hello!” She said. “I won’t kill you.” 

“That’s not a very reassuring greeting,” Hux replied. He tried to pull himself up to his full-height—a posture that had always been his go-to response when threatened—but pain from his ribs, or possibly the weight of the babies, stopped him.

The droid simply nodded. “I know.” 

“This is K-8TE, sarcasm and security droid,” Traveller said. “Mostly sarcasm these days though. Everyone else is eating in the dining room, but I’ll fetch you some bowls in here so you can get warm in peace. Folks get bored when there’s not much new to look at and you know how travellers like to talk.”

Dopheld didn’t know, but he could guess. He really didn’t feel like being interrogated by well meaning strangers right now, and from the look on Hux’s face the feeling was mutual. 

They were left alone with just the silent droid and crackling fire. They chose a table close to the cylindrical fire pit in the middle of the space—the columns that supported the chimney were too narrow to entirely block her view, but they gave a small measure of privacy from her blank unmoving gaze. 

This room of the inn had been much more welcoming when it was busy. 

“Meow?” 

Millicent appeared from Hux’s hood, leaning forward to sniff at the smoke rising from the fire. As she tensed to jump Hux placed a restraining hand on her back.

“Stay there, please, Millie. Just for now.” He said quietly. 

His eyes were fixed on Dopheld in a way that seemed to be trying to convey something meaningful, but Dopheld couldn’t interpret the shifting of Hux’s expression, no matter how determinedly he raised his eyebrows.

If he ever saw the ghost of Kylo again Dopheld should ask for tips on mindreading. 

Before Hux had the chance to snap at him, Traveller had reappeared in the doorway with three bowls and a plate of crusty bread balanced along his arms. 

“Can you check the perimeter again for me, K8?” He asked. “If there’s no one else around I think we might as well start battening down for the night. Not likely to be anyone else out in this storm.”

“The spherical one doesn’t like me,” K-8TE said flatly as she turned towards the door.

“No one likes you, love, you know that,” Traveller replied, the dark horizontal line of his irises moving in what might have been his species's version of an eye roll. “Now, off you fuck, I’m not having you making a gravid guest nervous. You know Lady Qi wouldn’t like that.”

While he spoke, Traveller placed the bowls on the table in front of them, two large portions of soup the humans plus a smaller one for Millicent. The bread smelled like it was fresh.

Dopheld kept his eyes on the food—he’d glanced at Hux’s expression when the droid referred to him as the ‘spherical one’, and he really didn’t want to see how Hux reacted to ‘gravid’. He wouldn’t survive if he laughed.

Once the outer door closed, Traveller sat on the bench opposite them, his slim green face passive as Dopheld tried a mouthful from all three bowls for safety’s sake. 

“You don’t need to worry about K8,” he said quietly to Hux. “As I said to your Mate here when he first visited us—she has none of her Imperial programming, and no records from that era either.” A subtle glance towards Hux’s hair accompanied that statement. “The Empire fucked over this planet when they fled, the Republic didn’t lift a finger to help us, and the First Order never even glanced in our direction. The Resistance didn’t come here until the war was already over, because—why bother? So. This house has no alignment. We don’t ask where people came from, and we only ask where you’re going in case you need directions.”

Throughout this speech Hux poked thoughtfully at his soup. Beside him Millicent was wolfing down her own portion with small ‘yam-yam-yam’ noises as if she hadn’t eaten in weeks.

“I understand you have rooms to let?” Hux said at last, clearly electing not to address any of the things Traveller had mentioned.

“Yes, for as long as you need, at a very reasonable rate. I’ll even give you a discount if either of you can help around the place—with Lady Qi gone there’s just the two of us, and K8 is a terrible barmaid.”

“That’s very trusting of you, but we won’t need more than a night.” 

Traveller tipped his head. “Pheld told me you’d be needing ship parts, which you could only get from one town or the other, possibly both depending how obscure your requirements are. The roads are not good here. The only thing that distinguishes the road from the moorland is that someone put white rocks along the edge of the road.”

“We’ll stay together.” Hux said flatly. His shoulders were tense, like he was forcing himself to sit upright when instinct made him want to curl in on himself. “We’ll be fine.”

“I’m not saying you need to split up,” Traveller replied immediately, raising his long fingered hands in a calming gesture. “I’m just suggesting that you shouldn’t travel. Lady Qi should be back soon enough with transport that I’m sure she’d share with you, and in the meantime we can send messages to the markets in both towns to get the supplies reserved for you.”

The next time Dopheld breathed in, he felt the hair at the back of his neck lift. Hux was really, truly frightened. All the things they’d been through and Dopheld had never smelled that on him so strongly before, not to the point of reacting to it. Maybe it was his pregnancy heightening the effect but either way it made Dopheld want to bare his teeth.

“You’re very determined to keep us here.” Hux said.

His tone was level but something about it made Traveller sag in his seat.

“I told K8 not to upset you, and here I am doing it anyway,” as he spoke he stood up and took a couple of steps back. “I’m not trying to trap you here, I just wanted to give some advice for your safety. Lady Qi has always made a point that this should be a safe place for people like yourself but I pushed too far. I’m sorry.”

Hux didn’t reply. Dopheld could see that his jaw was clenched tight. Unfortunately Dopheld couldn’t think of anything to say either. He was used to following Hux.

Something slammed outside the window, making them both jump as the quality of the light in the room changed. There hadn’t been much grey light coming in from outside but what little there had been abruptly vanished. 

Traveller’s red eyes seemed to glitter menacingly in the gloom. Dopheld wondered why he’d been so ready to trust him before.

The door opened and K-8TE shambled back inside, water dripping from her long arms with each step. 

“There’s no one out there,” she said. “I’ve closed the shutters.”

Behind her the heavy locking mechanism of the door clunked into place.

Dopheld felt sick. Bringing Hux here had seemed like such a good idea when he’d first visited. There had been a crowd of customers then. Just a place to pass through like any other bar or cantina. 

Now it was just the three of them shut in a room with a stranger and a security droid. 

Hux picked up Millicent, holding her close across his chest. “Could you show us to a room, please? We can decide what we’re going to do next tomorrow.”

To Dopheld’s relieved surprise, Traveller simply nodded and headed towards the stairs at the back of the room. 

Rather than following them K-8TE turned towards the other door. When she passed through there was a brief snatch of jumbled conversation, like a dozen people were all speaking at once. 

So there really were other people here.

Perhaps he was just being paranoid. 

* * *

The room could have been part of the set for a holomovie, it was so bland and generic. The building was old, but the walls had been smoothed with insulating plastcrete. There was a normal bed, a chair, and sliding door that led to a tiny refresher. The only unusual thing was the window.

Like the external walls that seemed to have been built by piling up any vaguely square stone that could be found, the window had been made of many small chunks of transparisteel, held together with ribs of solder. It probably distorted the view of the landscape outside. Not that they could see anything since the shutters had been closed up here too. 

Dopheld was studying the room in so much detail because Hux was sitting on the end of the bed, staring blankly at the chair he’d shoved under the door handle. He was slowly turning one of his wrist knives in his fingers. Every few seconds the corners of his mouth flexed down. 

Hux had gone through fear and come out at anger. 

Just because it was a silent anger right now didn’t mean it would stay that way.

Dopheld almost jumped when Millicent rubbed against his boot, winding her tail around his ankle as she purred. Well, at least she wasn’t mad at him.

“Millie!” Hux snapped, clicking his fingers beside him. “Over here!”

The cat looked at them both, then wandered off to sniff at a bit of carpet fluff.

Hux growled. The noise went straight to Dopheld’s knees—he’d upset his Omega, he should beg forgiveness, he should fight his way out of here like a real Alpha would have done. 

Instead he retreated to the refresher, like a coward. 

There was a mirror directly opposite the door. He screwed his eyes shut so he didn’t have to meet his own guilty, humiliated gaze. 

He’d really, really fucked up.

Something fell into the sink with a clatter. 

He opened his eyes again, expecting to see that he’d accidentally trapped Millicent in the room with him. 

There was a small bottle of shampoo sitting in the sink. It must have fallen from the collection of complimentary toiletries. Maybe closing the door had disturbed it.

When he leaned forward to put it back on the shelf below the mirror, Dopheld breathed on the glass, which revealed that someone had written ‘YOU’RE SAFE’ with a finger across its surface.

He stared at the words for a second, then turned on the hot tap. 

Leaning close to the running water—so that Hux wouldn’t hear him—Dopheld whispered, “Kylo? Is that you?”

The bottle fell from the shelf again, bouncing off his ear on the way down. 

“Ow! Very mature,” he sighed. 

He thought about what Hux had said about the Force and mind control. What if Traveller was a Force user? What if he had used a mind trick to bring them here and was giving them fake reassurances now? How could Dopheld be certain this was really Kylo?

Picking a spot somewhere a few inches above his own eye line, Dopheld martialled his expression into something close to commanding and said with a glare, “Prove it’s you.” 

‘I GAVE CAT’ appeared below ‘YOU’RE SAFE’ on the now steamy mirror’s surface in a series of quick lines.

A moment later he felt a familiar hand settle around his throat. There was no threat to it, not even a hint of tightening in the fingers, but it made him shudder anyway. 

The contact vanished.

“Should I call you Kylo, or Ben?” He asked, remembering that Hux had specifically said that Ben had given him Millicent, not Kylo.

The letter besh appeared on the mirror, filling the last of the available space. It was probably as close as a ghost could get to shouting.

“Okay. Ben it is. Why should I trust you?”

The word ‘SAFE’ from the original message was underlined, and then surrounded with two sets of brackets.

“You kept us safe? Was that what you were doing when I saw you in front of Max, in the ship?”

This time the shampoo bottle tapped once against the metal of the sink. 

Dopheld frowned. “Oh, are we doing ‘once for yes, twice for no’?”

Tap.

Well, the mirror was completely covered now, and wiping it clean wouldn’t add more writing surface until the steam dried out. Dopheld scrubbed it with his hand anyway. Hux would think he’d gone mad if he noticed it later.

So, what should he ask Kylo, or Ben rather, that could be answered with just yes or no?

“We’re definitely safe here?”

Tap.

“You’re sure?”

Tap.

“Do you, sorry,  _ did _ you know the owners of this place?”

Tap tap.

“Why are you so sure then?”

The bottle rolled in a slow circle around the sink. How an inanimate object managed to move sarcastically Dopheld would never be able to say, but somehow Ben had achieved that.

“Sorry, I guess that’s not a ‘yes/no’ question, is it?”

Tap tap.

“Is the Force telling you we’ll be safe here?”

The bottle hovered for longer than Dopheld would like before it tapped against the sink just once.

“I suppose that’s the best we can get.” 

Tap.

“I can’t tell Max that  _ you _ said that though, can I?”

TAPtap.

The emphasis of Ben’s reply almost made Dopheld chuckle before guilt washed over him that he was being amused by something  _ Kylo Ren  _ was doing. The man who’d ruined so much, and hurt so many.

An image of the blue figure wrapped around Hux’s stomach drifted across Dopheld’s mind again. And the beep of the guidance systems changing direction all those times.

“You’ve been keeping us safe for a while, have you?” He asked. He knew the answer, but asking out loud would make the knowledge real.

Tap.

Hux had been right—Ben was hiding on their ship, just not the way he’d thought.

“He can’t see you, can he?”

This time two taps were slow, like Ben didn’t want to answer. That at least was a relief. Hux had made it clear how much he’d suffered at Kylo’s hands. The sense of guilty unease started to creep back in again.

Feeling like he was back on the Finaliser, about to be strangled again, Dopheld set his jaw and said, “I… I’ve only heard hints of what you did, but… I don’t understand. Did you ever actually love him?”

The bottle dropped into the sink, rolled towards the plughole, and gently rocked to a halt.

Ben was gone.

Behind him there was a knock on the ‘fresher door.

When he opened it Dopheld found Hux glaring at the doorframe with his arms crossed over the top of his bump. He had his ankles crossed too. 

“Sorry,” Dopheld mumbled, and moved quickly out of the way of his pregnant Mate.

He heard Hux mutter ‘bloody tap left on, it's like a sauna in here’ before the door closed, but Hux didn’t say anything to him directly.

Dopheld couldn’t say he didn’t deserve that. 

He should do something useful. He couldn’t just stand here waiting for Hux to tell him what to do. 

Looking around the room he realised that the bed was placed so that the occupants would be vulnerable from the door. But there was an alcove to the left of the door with no direct line of sight at all. 

Hux had already started nesting back in the ship—even if he wouldn’t admit to it—so maybe Dopheld should behave like a proper Alpha for once and make Hux somewhere safe to sleep.

* * *

When Hux returned from the refresher, he stood in the doorway for almost a minute, staring blankly at the nest Dopheld had tried to build him. There wasn’t a great deal of bedding in the room, and they’d only brought one change of clothes, but the shape of the alcove added to the feeling of enclosure. 

Dopheld had even stripped out of his own shirt to add it to the pile—though he wasn’t sure he was the Alpha that Hux wanted to be smelling right now. Hopefully Hux’s body would appreciate it, even if his brain was still angry.

“Do you really think it's a good idea to sleep with no sightline to the door?” Hux said at last, turning a disappointed look to where Dopheld was sitting against the headboard of the now bare bed.

“I think it’s a good idea for  _ you _ to sleep where no one will see you, while I sit here and watch the door,” Dopheld replied. He gestured to the blaster resting on his knee. “It’s my fault we’re here, so I’ll stay awake.”

Hux bristled, his shoulders pulling back, but he winced before he could argue and pressed a hand to his side. 

“Fine.” He snapped.

He walked over the nest, stomping with care if such a thing were possible, and began to rearrange it. Millicent gave a sleepy meep of protest as the cushion she was sleeping under was pulled roughly away.

“I’m sorry.”

A brief pause in Hux’s movements told him that his words had been heard, but they weren’t acknowledged.

Dopheld fixed his gaze on the door handle, and tried not to think. 

By his estimation twenty minutes had passed like as many hours before Hux quietly said, “I checked the room, while you were… doing whatever you were doing in the refresher. There are no bugs or cameras. No hidden panels. The window doesn’t open, but it looks breakable if we had no choice. The shutters are locked. I don’t know if you could force them open from the inside.”

“Right.” Dopheld wasn’t sure what else he could say. 

When he looked up again, he realised he couldn’t see Hux at all amongst the blankets on the floor. One lump seemed to be breathing slowly, and Millicent was perched on a possible hip beside the first, but that was all he could see of his Mate.

“Why did you trust these people?” Hux asked.

He couldn’t really get away with saying that he didn’t know. He had no other answer, so he deflected instead. “You trust Fonre and his family, it’s the same thing.” 

“They don’t have an Imperial droid working for them.” Hux turned his head just enough for Dopheld to see an eye glaring at him from between two sheets. “I saw dozens of KX units as a child. How can we be sure that one doesn’t know me? They said the Resistance came here.”

“To the  _ planet, _ not here.”

“What if they want to sell us?”

“To the Resistance?  _ You _ worked for them, you gave away secrets!” Dopheld hissed, that old hurt reopened for the first time in weeks by the stress of not confidently knowing if they were really safe. 

Millicent opened her eyes and twisted her head back as if she was looking at someone above her. Perhaps it was Ben. Dopheld couldn’t find the energy to care right now.

“Only three people in the Resistance knew it was me, I have no idea if they told anyone else. Even if they did, most of them would kill me anyway.”

Dopheld huffed through his nose, uncomfortable as always with this conversation.

“Look, I really don’t think they care. Traveller has only been here a few years so he won’t remember your father, and from what I’ve heard you don’t look that much like him anyway. Even if the droid has its memories how likely is it to recognise you? You were what, four or five when you left? You have a beard now!”

“I’m as wide as B—him,” Hux muttered.

“I wouldn’t say you’re  _ wide _ ,” Dopheld replied before he could stop himself.

Hux sat up, dislodging Millicent in the process. She tumbled out of the nest to land in a heap.

“Mew!”

“Really? Do you think this is funny?” Hux asked. His expression could have started multiple fires.

“No,” Dopheld said. He wanted to look away, but he knew that would only make matters worse. “I understand that you’re worried. And I know it’s my fault. And I didn’t mean for you to take that as an insult. You know I love how you look right now. I just… I’m sorry.”

Perhaps it was finally making proper eye contact, or maybe it was just exhaustion, but the anger on Hux’s face finally crumpled.

“I’ve been trying so hard to keep them alive,” he said in a trembling voice. “Trying for nothing. I should have died on the Steadfast, instead we were lured here, back to this awful planet, where we’re all going to die because I shouldn’t have been born in the first fucking place.”

Watching the door be damned, Dopheld couldn’t sit so far away from his Mate while he fell apart in front of him. He crossed the room in a few quick strides and sank to his knees to pull Hux close. 

“We’re not going to die here, I won’t let us,” Dopheld murmured against his ear, hoping that scent and proximity would help where words were still failing. “I honestly believe we’re safe here. But I don’t know what you mean by ‘lured here’, we came to Arkanis by accident.”

“We were shot at out of nowhere. We were forced to land.”

Dopheld moved back a little to look at his Mate in concern. “Don’t you remember? You chose the coordinates. There’s no way they’d have known you’d bring us here. And they didn’t follow us.”

Frowning, Hux rubbed his forehead. “Oh. Yes. I’m… tired.”

“I can’t explain why this place feels safe to me, but it does.” Dopheld said. One of the babies kicked his hand where it was resting on Hux’s stomach, as if the child agreed with him. “Get some sleep. I’ll watch the door. We can make our decisions tomorrow.”

Hux nodded, and leaned forward to rest his head on Dopheld’s shoulder. “Stay here? Until I’m asleep.” 

“Of course.”

Beside Dopheld’s feet Millicent was staring up at a point about six feet above the floor, just in front of the chair blocking the door. Dopheld nodded an acknowledgement towards whatever invisible thing she was focusing on. Almost imperceptibly his feeling of safety increased. 

* * *

Watching an unmoving door for eight hours in harder work than a person might expect. It took a special kind of focus to look at nothing and stay ready in the process. The sort of focus that made a good sniper. 

Dopheld was not a sniper.

Somewhere around hour three he’d found a small piece of tinfoil in his pocket. It was probably left over from the sweets he occasionally bought for the Nautolan kids. 

He’d fiddled with it in one hand for a while, twisting it into shapes while across the floor Millicent went from pacing around the invisible presence by the door to sleeping on her back with all four legs in the air.

There were no sounds from the rest of the building now. There had been a point when he’d heard chairs scraping over tile and doors closing, but that had been a long time ago.

Outside a bird called across the moors occasionally.

Hidden under his pile of bedding Hux snuffled and snored until he rolled onto his other side.

The piece of tinfoil was falling apart, too many folds weakening the structure. He rolled the bits into a ball. It was smaller than his smallest fingernail. He wondered if it was bigger than his baby’s hand. 

Pushing aside the worry he was still feeling over Hux’s confusion, Dopheld focused on the ball of foil.

It was tiny.

Maybe he could move it.

If he just thought hard enough.

* * *

By the time the shutters clattered against the walls outside, letting a beam of brackish daylight sidle into the room, Dopheld could make the tinfoil roll an inch. 

An inch wasn’t much, and he couldn’t control the direction of travel, but yesterday he hadn’t been able to move anything at all with his brain. He was almost tempted to show Hux, but he wasn’t sure how he would react. Best case scenario he’d say it was magnetism or the effect of his breathing on the ball; worst case scenario he might stab him. Getting stabbed was highly unlikely but also not worth the risk. Not yet anyway. 

Talking to Hux about being very-slightly Force sensitive was probably a conversation that could wait until after the babies were born. 

As meagre as the sunlight was, it was still enough to wake the man in question from his slumber. Well, it didn’t properly wake him, but the light still managed to make Hux roll onto his back with a melodramatic groan and an arm flung over his eyes.

“Good morning,” Dopheld said quietly as he slipped the foil back into his pocket.

Hux raised his arm just enough to show Dopheld one specific finger, then let it flop back over his eyes.

“Nothing good about it,” Hux muttered. “How many times did we crash the ship?”

“Only the once. I wouldn’t really have called it a crash though, you did pretty well, all things considered.”

“I feel like I’ve been through one of those massive washing machines we had on dec—“ Hux cut himself off before he said anything identifying. “Urgh. I feel worse than when I was executed.”

Dopheld sat up a little straighter at that—between residual aches from their landing and a night spent on watch he wasn’t feeling great himself, but for Hux to be feeling so unwell…

“The babies are fine, by the way,” Hux said, uncovering his face to run both hands over his bump. “Right now Med is doing horrible things to my ribs, while their sibling seems to have found muscles in my hips that I never knew I had.”

“Do you need a medic?” Dopheld asked with growing concern. 

He gave up on watching the door and crossed the room to sit on the floor beside Hux, placing a hand on the upper curve of his belly away from the places that apparently hurt.

As if she was a soldier taking over his post, Millicent jumped up to settle into his vacated seat on the bed, though she might have just been stealing his left over warmth.

Hux stared at the ceiling for a moment, chewing slightly on his lower lip. “I think I just need rest,” he said at last. “Everything hurts but there’s no sharp pains anywhere.”

“You got quite confused last night,” Dopheld prompted. “Is your head okay?”

“I’m going to blame that on exhaustion and a lifetime of well grounded paranoia.” He half-laughed, then winced. “I still don’t entirely trust this place, but even the thought of getting to the bathroom seems like too much. There’s no way we can leave.”

“I shouldn’t have brought you across the moorland.” Another layer of guilt added to the horrible weight resting on Dooheld’s brain. “That was stupid.”

He leaned forward to hide his face gently against Hux’s stomach.

“I’m sorry.” 

One of Hux’s hands shifted to run over his hair, while under his cheek one of the babies shifted ever so gently.

“You didn’t make that decision.” Hux said. “After a decade of giving you commands you can’t really expect me to get out of the habit anytime soon. Besides, staying in the ship alone wasn’t an option either. If for some reason you didn’t come back we’d have been in an even worse situation.”

“True.”

“Now, as sweet as this is, I’m going to have to cut it short and ask you to help me up.” Hux patted him on the head in exactly the same way he usually signalled Millicent to get off his lap. It was a strange feeling to receive the same treatment as the cat. 

As he helped Hux cross the room to the refresher Millie gave him a look that said the feeling was mutual.

* * *

The room they’d dined in the night before was actually occupied this morning, with one party standing around a table studying maps, and another smaller group drinking strong smelling caf in silence. 

It was a reassuring sign that no one looked up as he descended the stairs.

The fire was still burning, but much lower than before. Perhaps they only built it up for new arrivals, which were unlikely so early in the day. Outside it was raining, as it probably would for at least another month. Not that the weather on Arkanis ever changed for long.

He didn’t see a familiar face until he passed into the room where they’d heard voices last night. 

K-8TE was serving breakfast foods at a long buffet-like station along one wall. She was wearing an incongruous pink apron. There was no way to know if this was by her own choice or not.

“Just you?” She said when she’d handed off the last plate to her previous customer. “What about the spherical one? Doesn’t he need fuel?”

Ignoring the shape comment Dopheld said, “he’s too tired to come down, are we allowed to take food to our rooms?”

“So long as you clean up any mess you make I couldn’t care less what you do in your room,” K-8 replied flatly. 

“I’d recommend you eat down here,” Traveller said, suddenly appearing at Dopheld’s elbow, “then you can carry the other two plates up without dropping them.”

That made some kind of sense—Millicent didn’t eat much compared to the humans, but she would need a separate bowl.

Dopheld nodded. “Okay, I’ll come back for the rest in a minute then, so it doesn’t go cold. Is that alright?” He asked the droid.

Servos whirred as she shrugged. “It doesn’t matter in the slightest to me what you do with your life.”

“Do you ever get used to that?” He asked when he realised Traveller was following him to the table he’d chosen in the corner of the room. He’d trusted the skinny Duros when they first met but Hux’s concerns made him uncomfortable now.

“The attitude? Yeah, after a while.”

Traveller took a seat diagonally opposite Dopheld, one that meant he wasn’t blocking the exit if Dopheld wanted to leave. It seemed deliberate.

When he didn’t say anything else Dopheld elected to start eating his porridge in silence. If Traveller wanted to talk he would talk.

“Look, I’m sorry about last night.” The Duros said eventually, staring at his own long fingers. “We didn’t mean to scare your Mate, or you. Times are hard in the rest of the Galaxy right now, but not much has changed here and sometimes we forget that. What happened wasn’t the sort of welcome Lady Qi would want us to give you.”

“You’ve mentioned this Lady Qi a few times, should I recognise the name?”

“Oh, not at all. Not unless you were part of one or two long defunct secret organisations. I don’t think you’re a good enough actor for that.”

Dopheld put down his spoon, his heart racing in his chest.

Traveller gave what was probably a wide smile for his species. It was barely a twitch of his hollow cheeks. “See, you couldn’t fool anyone at all. Don’t worry, she’s an independent now. I haven’t lied, this house has no alignment. Lady Qi… has been a lot of things—thief, pirate, spy… cook.” He laughed a little at the disconnect of the last title.

“Lady Qi used to work at the Academy, those ruins out on the moor,” Traveller went on, gesturing over his shoulder. “Sad story. She was hiding from some people when the Empire fell and brought the war here. Her… partner, I suppose, though the word doesn’t feel right for what a nasty piece of work he was—her partner left her here during the evacuation because she was pregnant and his wife wouldn’t have her on the ship. But, just to make her that little bit more miserable, he took their older son with him. She never saw that boy again. Still she got back on her feet. She took over this place and rebuilt it from almost nothing. Fourteen years after the war, raiders stole her other son away too. She’s been looking for him ever since. That’s why she’s gone now—the drama with Palpatine has everyone looking for lost loved ones. She’s hoping someone’s seen him, somewhere. Lady Qi has always had a soft spot for little ones, that’s why she’d want us to be careful with you and your Mate.”

Dopheld sat staring at Traveller for what felt like hours. He knew his mouth was open but he couldn’t get the wits about him to close it again.

He’d spent all that time last night telling Hux that they were here on Arkanis out of nothing but chance. Now he wasn’t so sure.


	12. Chapter 12

After hearing the vague but oddly specific history of Lady Qi’s life, Dopheld had struggled to concentrate on the details of Traveller’s job offer. Both his brain and belly were too full to think straight. At least the work that needed to be done seemed to be easy enough. 

The Red Sky In Mourning Inn was rarely fully occupied, but it was never entirely empty either, so there was always cleaning and general maintenance to be done. A third pair of hands—Pheld’s if he was willing—would be appreciated. There were some more technical jobs that Hux would be able to do, or at least guide Dopheld through, but for now they were willing to give their little family free room and board on just Dopheld’s contribution. 

He was struck by the generosity of the offer—how many times had he heard as a child that those outside the Order only ever helped themselves? Part of him wanted to be suspicious still, but Ben’s earlier reassurance dampened the concern like a blanket over a fire. 

Was that the Force? Or psychic control? Or just a lingering habit for taking commands?

Dopheld was following Traveller back into the other room—with two covered bowls of breakfast foods in his hands—without entirely realising that he had left the table he was so distracted.

The group that had been looking over maps were still bickering as Traveller approached them, but strangely one of their number was looking directly over the Duros’ shoulder at Dopheld with a puzzled frown. 

There was nothing familiar to Dopheld about this muscular young man with short dreadlocks and expressive features, but he was staring at Dopheld as if he was trying to place his face. 

Until this moment he had thought that being a small and unmemorable Alpha would be enough to keep him unnoticed. Now he felt like this man could divine his former rank just by staring at him hard enough.

Another member of the group turned away from his own argument with a look of concern. “Finn? You all right?”

Despite being even shorter than Dopheld, he had said the first man’s name with all the warmth of an Alpha addressing their Mate. Perhaps everything Dopheld thought he knew about the galaxy was nonsense. He wouldn’t be surprised about that anymore.

‘Finn’ sniffed and shook his head in a noncommittal way. 

A slightly taller woman with her hair in complex braids also looked up. Her stare was gentler, but something about being studied by these three felt like being called up on a charge. 

Dopheld knew he must be radiating nervous Alpha energy, made worse by the bowls in his hands forcing him to keep an open posture. Years of training wanted his body to stand at attention like a good soldier but he could practically hear Hux in his head telling him not to be stupid. 

For a moment there was a hint of Force pressure around his throat that slipped away to his left. Almost instantly the woman’s eyes turned towards the movement as if she could see it.

Completely oblivious to the strange human behavior, Traveller said, “These are the folks who’ll be heading to both of our neighbouring towns shortly. I understand Rose here is their engineering expert.” He gestured to a fourth woman Dopheld hadn’t noticed before.

Traveller went on, “Pheld here has suffered some ship malfunctions, and is in need of replacement parts—while you’re travelling would you be able to pass a message to one or two traders who could help?”

“Pheld? Do I know you?” Finn said directly to Dopheld, either ignoring or not hearing the rest of Traveller’s question.

“I’m sorry but I don’t think so. I don’t recognise your face,” Dopheld replied, trying to hide his accent in a way that Traveller might not pick up on, but mostly failing to change his voice at all. 

Apparently that was the wrong answer because Finn’s eyes immediately narrowed.

The woman with the braids unexpectedly came to Dopheld’s rescue by placing a calming hand on Finn’s back. 

“It doesn’t matter where he came from,” she said. “It’s where he’s going that matters.”

“I just want to get my ship and my Mate back home,” Dopheld added, and hoped he was smiling rather than grimacing at her. Now that he was looking at her, he realised she wore a shiny new lightsaber hilt at her hip. A Force user? He tried to clear his mind to avoid the telepathy some of them were said to have, but just found himself focusing on the thought of his unborn children.

If she read his mind he couldn’t see any sign of that in her face.

“We can’t detour just to bring you random ship parts, we don’t have time,” said Finn’s possibly-Mate.

The woman started to say “Poe—” but Traveller cut in, “We’re not asking you to bring them back, just let the traders know what we need so we can collect the parts when we have transportation available. We’ve done this before, electronic messages don’t travel well on Arkanis.”

Rose shrugged, “I can’t see any problem with that, we’ll be doing the same on a larger scale anyway.”

“I can see a problem—he could be using us to send a code,” Finn said, his eyes still narrow.

“What?” Dopheld blurted out, confused. He had no idea what the man meant. When Finn’s expression didn’t change, Dopheld chose to speak directly to the woman with the lightsaber instead. “If you’re concerned I can give you the list in plain text, I could even… I don’t know, find some flimsi and a burnt twig to write it by hand if it makes you feel better. I don’t mean you any harm, I don’t even know your names, I… I just know that my Mate is pregnant and I would rather our twins be born at home than here.” Looking down at the bowls in his hands he added, “And I really would like to get breakfast to our room before it goes cold.”

The woman gave him a sympathetic smile. “Of course, no one should go hungry.”

“Good point,” Traveller agreed. “You head upstairs to Max, I’ll continue to talk to our friends here and see what we can arrange. I’ll collect your parts list later if they’re able to take it.”

Resisting the urge to run from the room Dopheld headed towards the stairs. 

He was five steps up when he heard the unnamed woman say “You can trust him.” 

Logically he knew she must have been addressing her companions, but it felt like the words were intended for him. He wondered if she meant Ben.

As if summoned by the thought, Dopheld felt the press of a single fingertip against his lips while he tried to open the door with his elbow. 

“Alright, I’m not an idiot,” He muttered under his breath. He assumed he was being told not to tell Hux about the strange people downstairs. The pressure remained.

“I won’t tell him,” he sighed out loud. The sensation stopped. “You could open the damn door though.”

Nothing happened.

Dopheld remembered that he needed to unlock the door first. He really needed some sleep. Unless this was all a nightmare and he’d fallen asleep while he should have been on watch. He sighed again, mostly for his own benefit.

* * *

He didn’t notice that Hux had a blaster pointed at him until after he’d awkwardly maneuvered through the door with a bowl in each hand and the security access card held between his teeth. 

They stared at each other in silence until the locking mechanism clicked behind him. 

For a moment Hux visibly sagged with relief where he was sitting on the bed. He lowered the blaster, but didn’t release his grip. “Where the fuck have you been?”

“Getting breakfast and listening to Traveller’s job offer,” Dopheld replied as he placed the smaller bowl on the floor for Millicent, who was making the task harder by always being directly beneath his hand, meowing like a starving creature. “He talks a lot.”

“What does he want?” Hux asked as he took his own bowl without meeting Dopheld’s eye. He looked as if he were feeling embarrassed about being worried. It wouldn’t help his mental state to know he might have been right to worry.

“Generic maintenance work, cleaning, possibly bartending or cooking,” Dopheld shrugged a little and sat down beside Hux so their legs were pressed together. “There’s some electrical work that would probably benefit from your guidance, but they’re fine with it being just me.”

“Does it feel like a trap?”

What felt like a broad left hand squeezed Dopheld’s right shoulder from behind. He wondered if another invisible hand was resting on Hux’s own shoulder, and whether he could feel anything at all.

“No, it’s not a trap.” Dopheld said. It didn’t feel like a lie.

* * *

To his own embarrassment Dopheld was asleep with his face resting against Hux’s bump when Traveller knocked at the door to collect the list of parts they needed. 

Fortunately Hux had already written out all their requirements, with alternative parts and workarounds listed wherever they might be possible. Trust him to be as efficient as possible with the process of getting off the planet.

They elected to stay in their room while the list was handed over to the travellers—Hux out of his own paranoia, and Dopheld from a better founded fear that his presence might cause problems. He’d half dreamt about that face of the man he hadn’t recognised, but his unconscious mind hadn’t provided any more data. He’d never seen that man’s face during all his life in the First Order, or their travels since then.

Hux watched from their window as the group left the Inn, though the constant rain made them little more than blurry shapes on wide low transport vehicles. They split up where the path from the Inn met the main road and quickly vanished.

Dopheld had returned to laying on the bare mattress as soon as Traveller left. He had been hoping to get in a second nap before he headed back downstairs to begin his work with K8, but without Hux to hold his mind was running in circles again.

“Can… could you come and sit with me?” He asked nervously.

Hux turned towards him with a raised eyebrow. After a moment his gaze drifted towards the pile of fabric in the corner that Millicent was currently occupying.

“Or we could…” Dopheld started, but he could see the blush on Hux’s cheeks and decided not to say anything out loud. 

Similarly silent, Hux walked over to the thing-he-wouldn’t-call-a-nest and sank down against the wall at the edge of the blankets where he could at least see part of the door. He patted the main part of the nest in an awkward invitation.

Without being asked, Millicent quietly hopped out of the pile, paused to rub her face against Hux’s side, and then wandered over to stand guard in front of the door just as she had done the night before. Dopheld felt light with fondness for everyone else in the room. Their strange little family was starting to work like a well organised unit. 

Accepting the invitation he crossed to the nest and laid down where Hux had indicated. Cushions and bits of fabric were immediately moved around him in a precise but mysterious order that seemed all the stranger because Hux wasn’t acknowledging what he was doing. 

Dopheld draped an arm gently across his Mate’s lap and nuzzled his face against Hux’s bump. One of the babies kicked him. 

“The other day you said you’ve got sixteen weeks left,” Dopheld said quietly. 

Hux’s voice was flat when he replied. “Med is twenty four weeks, full term is forty weeks. Therefore, sixteen weeks.”

“You know full term is—”

“It’s an aspiration,” Hux said before Dopheld could say ‘unlikely’. “I know it's wishful thinking but the closer I can get to that number the better things will be for Min.”

Dopheld nodded a little and shifted his hand to rest where Hux had said the smaller child was growing. If he concentrated hard enough he could almost believe he could feel movement.

“Five more weeks is the minimum maybe-survivable number for  _ both _ of them,” Hux went on. He’d placed his own hand on Dopheld’s hair, though whether it was for comfort or just to stop him looking up, Dopheld couldn’t tell. “And that’s with excellent medical care. Which wouldn’t be safely available here.”

“I know.” There wasn’t really anything else Dopheld could say. “I wish I could do more. I’m an Alpha, I should—”

Hux snorted. “What? Become a doctor in a month? Don’t start on designation stereotypes, Pheld. Not being a thick-skulled Alpha has always been one of the things I like about you. Protecting us is my job, yours is to keep us fed.”

From the other side of the room Millicent mewed questioningly.

“And your job is to keep my feet warm, Miss Magnificent,” Hux called to his cat with the nickname Dopheld had given her. Another way their family had come together.

She made a quiet meeping sound, as if the answer satisfied her.

“Can I ask you a question?” Dopheld said when Hux began absently stroking his hair in silence. “On a related but different topic?”

“Is it more or less depressing than the previous subject?”

“Ummm…”

Hux sighed. “Get on with it.”

Knowing he was probably making a mistake, Dopheld asked, “Your mother—could she have been pregnant when you left Arkanis?”

The hand on his hair stopped moving.

“She could have sprouted wings and flown away for all I know,” Hux said, his words slowing as if he was thinking hard behind the knee-jerk sarcastic response. “I suppose she could have been. One of the few things I clearly remember was her talking about baby names… I… huh. Maybe. Why?”

Dopheld related the story that Traveller had told him that morning. Hux hmmed at some of the details, reminding him that a high percentage of the Imperial fleet had kept affair partners in different locations and most would have claimed their children if they had the chance.

“Refusing to let Brendol’s pregnant mistress board the evacuation ships would have been exactly Maratelle’s style,” Hux said when the tale was finished. “Though if it were Brendol then I’d be surprised that he hadn’t smuggled her onboard anyway. He hated me with every fibre of his being, but he still kept me around because I was his child.”

“You did say the visual memory you had of her was a gun—maybe she didn’t want to go?”

Hux shrugged. “Or perhaps the second child wasn’t his. Traveller called her a spy, well, if she is my mother then my own failure in that department must be genetic. More likely—this is some other unfortunate woman who worked in the kitchen who happened to lose her son, and it's all coincidence. I don’t want to believe my mother is alive.”

“No?”

“No.” Hux finally let go of the blaster, placing it on the floor just long enough to run his hand over his stomach before he picked it up again. “Because that would mean she didn’t look for me. She ‘looked for the second child ever since’? Why not the first when she knew where he was—with the First Order. Besides, if she were alive meeting her wouldn’t be safe. She would recognise me and there would be no hiding for us any more. My cover would be blown. We’d be sold to the Hosnians, or Ren, or whoever else wants to see us dead.”

“You don’t have to worry about Kylo Ren any more,” Dopheld said without thinking.

Millicent made a scolding noise, while Hux froze at the name.

They shouldn’t have been talking about those things out loud. Dopheld sat up and looked towards the door. Was there someone listening? 

The cat was glaring back at him with her tail fluffed and swishing angrily. She wasn’t behaving as if she’d heard anyone else. 

There was a sharp pain in his ear, as if someone was twisting it. He had to assume that was Ben. 

“Pheld, what do you mean?” Hux asked. 

Dopheld sat up further to look him in the eye, but Hux was staring blankly into the distance. Hux had still been a little fond of Ben, even if he’d hated Kylo and still struggled to rationalise the fact that they were the same person. Had part of Hux still hoped Ben was alive? Or was he suspicious? He should not have broached this topic while he was tired.

“He’s…” The pain increased. “Dead. I overheard it downstairs.” The lie seemed to be enough—his ear began to throb as the phantom grip was released.

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.”

“I want to sleep now.” Hux said, the words ‘get out and leave me alone’ unsaid but clearly broadcast by his tone. 

Dopheld stood up. He felt like a fool for speaking without thinking, but he knew there was no way he could say anything else without making the situation worse.

Before he left—once Hux had settled himself back under the blankets of his nest and Millicent was glaring at him reproachfully from her place on his hip—Dopheld bent to press a kiss to Hux’s temple.

“I love you.”

“Love you too,” Hux muttered just before the door closed behind him.

* * *

Hux came down to join the evening meal that night, Millicent once again riding across his shoulders like a scarf, and sat close beside him as if nothing had happened. 

He seemed a little subdued, though probably no one but Dopheld would ever notice. 

Although it was a week before he felt well enough to contribute to the more active tasks around the building, Hux started work repairing various small electrical items that K8 brought to a table he’d claimed for himself by the firepit. Most of the items seemed to have been liberated from the ruins of the Academy, or left behind by travellers who hadn’t wanted to be ladened down with broken trash on the road.

A lot of datapads, a few navigation devices, a pair of MSE droids that mostly got in Dopheld’s way while he was cleaning but provided a comforting touch of home—Hux spent several hours a day bent over scraps of wire and solder fixing things just as he had in the back room of Fonre’s shop.

Millicent stalked around the communal spaces, catching small rodents and insects that turned the fur on on her chin lavender with the dust from their carapaces. 

It was peaceful.

On quiet days when Dopheld was cleaning recently vacated rooms, he used the solitude to practice moving things with the Force.

After a month he’d perfected the art of moving grit closer to the dustpan. Certainly nothing to show off about—not to Hux who had seen Kylo Ren’s powers first hand, or to Millicent, who would happily flip the dustpan over the first chance she got. He might have learned more with better guidance. Or perhaps that was all he was strong enough to do. It made his job a little easier though.

They reached the five week mark that Hux had said would be the earliest the babies could survive without incident, but also without any word on either ship parts or the return of Lady Qi.

K8 had at least helped Dopheld to cover the Orange Feline with a tarp, to keep the worst of the Arkanian rain out of the circuitry, and Traveller had passed their list to several other customers heading towards the towns since then. 

Still, it was hard not to feel frustrated.

The first time Dopheld felt Min pressed against his hand through Hux’s skin, he’d almost felt ready to hike there himself and get it all over with. 

He was tired of waiting. 

So when—late at night, while he was clearing up a spill by the bar—half a bottle of Corellian brandy floated from a shelf directly into his hand, he took Ben’s hint and drank it. 

* * *

The fire had burnt down to embers, the rest of the residents had gone to bed, and the windows had been shuttered for the night. The room was filled with shadows made darker by the glow of Dopheld’s lamp, but that light wasn’t responsible for the soft blue glow in the corner.

There was a figure lounging with his boots crossed on the table. Dressed in a loose tunic he looked far too casual to be Kylo Ren, but he certainly had the attitude to be a flyboy as Hux has called him.

Dopheld tried to sit confidently in the chair opposite the spirit of the former Supreme Leader, but he rarely drank and the brandy was much stronger than he’d expected, so the movement was more like falling than sitting.

“Ben?” He asked the figure.

The smile he received in response was almost a smirk. “Yes. Why? Have you been visited by anyone else?” 

Blushing Dopheld said, “No. Should I have been?”

“It’s not exactly quiet on this side,” Ben replied with a tip of his head that might have been a shrug. “I’m glad you’ve kept your training up, I couldn’t stand to keep writing on mirrors.”

He didn’t say anything else, but instead turned his head to look in the direction of the room where Hux and Millicent were currently sleeping. Whether he could see them through the floor Dopheld didn’t know, but his expression changed as if he could.

“Do you want me to call you Ben?” Dopheld tried not to sound nervous. Years of habitual deference were closing in on him. Or perhaps that was the brandy making the room spin.

The blue figure waved a hand, as if his name was no more important than the occasional flakes of ash drifting from the fire. “Whatever you want.”

“What I want to call you isn’t fit for polite society.”

“I was never polite.”

Dopheld touched his neck where he still felt the grip of the Force in his nightmares. “No. You weren’t. How about I call you the abusive fucker who traumatised my Mate.”

“Hux wasn’t an angel either, you know.” Ben snapped back, a hint of Kylo in his voice and posture for the first time since he’d appeared. Looking stricken he sat up, planting his feet squarely on the floor and running a hand shakily back through his hair. “Don’t let his looks fool you.” 

They stared at one another for a long moment. Dopheld could believe that what Ben said was true, but he’d never betray Hux by admitting it. 

Instead he replied, “I’ve never been focused on his appearance.”

Ben broke eye contact first.

“Neither was I, not once I really  _ knew _ him.” Ben pulled a knee close to his chest, the heel of his boot resting on the edge of the chair. A man his size shouldn’t have been so flexible. The man who had been Kylo Ren shouldn’t have looked so vulnerable. “I took the good times from him.”

“What?”

“I changed his memories. I made him forget me.” He tapped his chest over his heart as if he was making some distinction that Dopheld didn’t immediately understand. “I was a coward, I hid from Snoke behind lies and bravado and terrible choices.”

“I don’t follow. We all remember Kylo Ren as much as I wish we didn’t, and Hux remembers ‘Ben the sleepwalking flyboy persona’. So what did you make him forget?”

“Sleepwalking? That’s how he processed it?” Ben chuckled slightly, one large hand rubbing over his mouth as if he wanted to hide his smile. “I didn’t say I did a good job. I was a fool who tried to have everything, and ended up with nothing.”

“I never thought I’d agree with you so wholeheartedly, and yet here we are,” Dopheld said. “Did you know he was pregnant when you were messing with his mind?”

“The first I knew about the baby was when I died and found myself on your ship instead of... “ He waved a hand. “Everywhere. Nowhere. It doesn’t matter.”

“So you followed us?”

“I…” Ben glanced back at Dopheld’s eyes for a moment before he let them drift to a point somewhere behind him. “I loved him. I don’t know that I did it well, or with my whole heart. But part of me wanted to be with him. When he died… When I was told he had died...”

Ben trailed off, his eyes glittering with emotion that jarred with everything Hux had hinted of his time with Kylo Ren. 

Dopheld had seen the bruises. 

Bile rising in his throat he leaned forward, one shaky finger aimed at Ben’s face. “Pryde executed him on the bridge. I had to drag his body out of there. You ‘loved’ him but you gave the role that was rightfully his Enric Pryde?”

“He’d be dead now if Pryde hadn’t been in the way. Pryde reported directly to Palpatine. I was his puppet just like the rest of the fleet.”

Shaking his head Dopheld looked away in disgust. “Oh, of course you were. So, what happened? In the end? We were a little too busy running for our lives to find out.”

“Rey, the scavenger—she died to kill Palpatine completely. He was going to destroy everything. We fought him together, but  _ she _ bested him. I gave my life through the Force to bring her back again.”

“You died  _ for her _ ?” Dopheld barely remembered the scavenger who’d caused them so many problems, but his own love and loyalty Hux had him feeling offended on his Mate’s behalf.

“As far as I knew Hux was already dead, what did I have to live for?”

A lifetime of service rose in Dopheld’s throat to answer, “The Order!”

Ben shook his head. “If I hadn’t died you wouldn’t have Hux. I wouldn’t have been able to watch over you all, change the course of your ship, protect you—“

“Did you bring us here?”

“TheForce exists in everything. I could feel the threads of it, connecting the baby—the babies, to him, to her.”

That wasn’t an answer. Dopheld tried again. “Ben, did you bring us here?”

“Yes.” Ben was still staring over Dopheld’s shoulder. “He should have something about his past that he isn’t ashamed of. He should know his mother. I wasted mine.”

“I’m only concerned about his future. Our future.”

“I’m not worried about that.” Ben finally made eye contact with Dopheld again. It felt like having his soul analysed. “They’re in good hands. They’ll have a better Alpha than I could ever have been.”

All the rage and frustration dissipated into a hot cloud of embarrassment. Dopheld could see how Hux had fallen for Ben. He was more charming than Kylo had ever been. 

“I try,” he mumbled. An hour might have passed between Ben’s comment and his reply, or perhaps just a few minutes.

Ben only nodded.

“Should I tell him?” Dopheld asked. “I mean, I already told him you were dead, but I’m not sure he’d sleep at night knowing Ben the Flyboy has been haunting us and he can’t see you.”

“I’m sure he’ll figure it out.”

“He doesn’t have the For—“ Dopheld started to say, but he was interrupted by the thunderous clang of a dozen falling metal bowls.

As he turned Millicent dashed out of the wreckage, sprinting upstairs with more noise than an entire stormtrooper platoon. When he looked back Ben had vanished.

Shaking his head again, Dopheld staggered over to tidy up.

He’d had enough Force nonsense for a lifetime. 

He just wanted to curl up with his Mate, in their nest, and feel their children growing under his hand.


	13. Chapter 13

Hux had been fast asleep in the corner by the time Dopheld had finished clearing up. He had his back to the door but Millicent was curled as a loaf against his spine. Which was odd because Dopheld had been sure he’d seen her running up the stairs just after the bowls fell over. 

Perhaps he’d just imagined that. Or maybe Hux had woken up for just long enough to let her back in. 

Either way, she absolutely refused to move for the rest of the night, so Dopheld was forced to sleep on the floor just beyond the pile of fabric he’d built for Hux. 

He could technically have slept on the bare bed, but sleeping that far away from his family felt unthinkable. He needed to be able to reach out and touch them, even if he couldn’t hold them.

* * *

His morning hangover wished he’d slept in the bed, or possibly in the fresher. He hadn’t felt all that drunk when he was talking to Ben, certainly not as drunk as his liver was insisting he’d been. 

He didn’t even get the benefit of waking up next to his Mate. 

For a moment he panicked, assuming the worst, until he opened the door to their room and heard Hux speaking quietly to K8 downstairs about some technical details of her chassis. Judging by the other sounds breakfast was being eaten downstairs. 

Dopheld’s stomach joined his liver in its complaints.

Outside the sky was as clear as it ever got on Arkanis. Fresh air seemed like an excellent idea. Certainly a better idea than eating at least.

A few hours later, as he was repainting the external window frames, he heard someone behind him say, “Now, that’s a face I’m glad to see again!”

He turned to look up, and then up again, at the twisted yet genuine smile of one of the only three people he’d ever slept with. At this point Dopheld really had to wonder if Ben or the Force was toying with him—there were only so many coincidences that could be believed by a sane person.

There was no denying that the man in front of him was real. Matthias had always been built on a different scale than most other humans. He was looking well, his blond hair as unruly as ever, his skin slightly tanned like he’d recently been on a planet with more sunlight than Arkanis ever saw. Dopheld missed the sun now he knew what it felt like.

Standing behind Matthias—as if using the former radar technician as a shield—stood a young man that Dopheld had never seen before but recognised immediately. Despite the curtain of long wet hair, a crude forehead tattoo, and poorly implanted mechanical eyes the newcomer looked almost exactly like Hux. 

Traveller had said Lady Qi’s second son had been kidnapped, and she’d been trying to bring him home ever since. 

If this wasn’t the son in question Dopheld would eat whatever was left of his First Order hat.

Matthias turned to follow his gaze and blushed a little. “This is Techie, my, uh… mine.”

Techie pressed his forehead against one of Matthias’ biceps instead of responding. He didn’t look like he got out much.

Taking pity on him Dopheld switched his attention back to Matthias. 

“I thought you died in… that engine failure,” Dopheld stuttered, only just managing to keep his hungover brain from saying ‘the collapse of Starkiller Base’.

Matthias grinned sheepishly. “I was, uh, AWOL at the time. Meeting my Techie here saved my life in more ways than one. What are you going by these days? I’m just Matt now.”

“Pheld,” Dopheld said, trying not to grin himself at the starstruck way ‘Techie’ was smiling up at Matt. He wondered if that was how he looked at Hux when they were in company.

“So, what are you doing in this damp corner of the galaxy? When did you get out?” Matt asked. Dopheld definitely didn’t remember him being so chatty, but perhaps that was just love for you. “We’re only here because Techie’s mom found him, but that’s a long story. Apparently she owns this place.”

Techie waved awkwardly, his hand mostly hidden by his sleeve. He ducked as heavy drops of rain began to fall. The movement was reminiscent of someone who expected to be hit again. Whatever had happened to him, Dopheld immediately felt glad that he had Matthias by his side. Clearly his resemblance to Hux was making Dopheld soft.

“It’s a similarly long story,” Dopheld said, holding open the main door to the inn and gesturing for them to head inside. “But I have a Mate now, and a whole new life… well two new lives in a few months—we’re having twins.”

Hux looked up from his place by the firepit, almost elbow deep in the chassis of an old maintenance droid. If he recognised Matt he gave no sign of it.

Without a pause Techie crossed the room towards him, shaking back his sleeves as he said quietly, “T-that’s a four-handed job, let me help.”

“Thank you,” Hux murmured. There was a flash of white as his eyes widened for a moment, and an echoing whirr from Techie’s implants.

Standing face-to-face the resemblance was uncanny, even with Hux’s beard and pregnant belly. They could have been identical twins who’d lived very different lives. 

Neither of them spoke as they continued with their task, but it was clear that both their hands were shaking.

“Was he on…” Dopheld waved a hand in a circle, hoping that Matt would understand that he meant Starkiller Base. He’d always been something of a simple soul. Too many layers of deception might overwhelm him.

“Nah,” Matt shook his head. “We met in a dodgy spaceport. Where did you two meet?”

Dopheld searched Matt’s face for any sign that he was joking with him, but it seemed that he genuinely didn’t recognise the General who’d led the Starkiller project for all the years Matt had worked there. He wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or just offended on Hux’s behalf.

He didn’t have time to think of a lie before the door opened again, almost catching them both in the back.

The woman who stepped through was small and delicate in a way that Dopheld recognised as deliberately deceptive. He’d seen that trick often enough from Hux. There was the slightest shadow of flexible body armour in the lines of her clothes, and her elegantly tailored coat probably hid half an armoury in its folds. She moved like a fighter despite her age.

Her hair might have been auburn once. There were hints of that colour amongst the grey-white curls of her hair, though that might have just been Dopheld’s overactive imagination looking for more similarities between her and his Mate. 

He didn’t need to look far to find another feature in common between them—when she met his gaze it was like looking into Hux’s own changeable eyes, but only in his warmest and most tolerant moods.

Even at rest she seemed far happier than Hux had ever been in all the years they’d know each other. 

“Lady Qi!” Traveller said, apparently delighted, but drowned out by Matt saying, “Lady Qi’ra this is Pheld, we used to work together.”

“I uh, hello,” Dopheld stammered, feeling his heels click together in some kind of suicidal but automatic deference to this woman who was clearly his superior. He barely managed to keep himself from saluting. “I’m Pheld Hita—”

“I know who you are,” she replied. Dopheld’s heart was in his mouth for a second before she smiled. “At least, I know you’ve been helping Traveller in order to pay off all those ship parts I have on the transport outside. We arrived in the city to find quite the bill waiting for us.”

“Oh, yes! Yes, thank you so much, I can’t tell you how grateful I am to you, and to everyone here...” Dopheld knew he was babbling but when he turned to look at Hux for some kind of backup, he found his Mate was staring at Lady Qi with a frown. 

When he looked back he saw that she was wearing a very similar expression.

It was K-8TE who finally broke the silence. “Bill, have you been playing with pens again?”

She’d slipped unnoticed through the door behind Lady Qi. The rain water dripping from her black frame and the sharp delivery of the words made her seem more like the menacing security droid she’d once been. 

“Do I need to fetch the soap?” She asked, moving towards Techie with one hand outstretched. 

Techie had hidden his tattoo with his sleeve-covered fingers before the droid could touch his skin, but he gave her a soft smile as he shook his head. “N-no K8, it won’t wash away. But it’s okay.”

“Your eyes—” She started to say, but Traveller cut in again, louder this time.

“Bill?” He asked. Apparently he hadn’t noticed the second redhead standing next to Hux until that moment. “Lady Qi, is this your son?! You finally found him?”

Qi’ra beamed, and it was almost like a shining light had filled the room.

Dopheld was soon forgotten as Qi’ra fell into introductions, explanations and reassurances between the newcomers and her other employees. 

Heaving a sigh of relief, he turned to where Hux had been working. He was surprised to find his Mate still sitting there, quietly soldering connections while Millicent sat on the table beside him ostentatiously licking a paw.

Hux’s hands were hardly even trembling now, though his jaw was tight beneath the soft cover of his beard.

When Dopheld moved to his side Hux shook his head slightly. 

He didn’t want to talk. Not here at least.

So Dopheld sat quietly beside him, passing over tools whenever Hux pointed to what he wanted next. 

There was no rush. Even if she’d brought all the parts they needed to repair the Orange Feline, the work would still take time. Hux could speak when he was ready.

* * *

If Dopheld had been hoping for a chance to regroup later in Hux’s nest, his plan was derailed only two hours later when Lady Qi sat down in a chair opposite them both.

He hadn't noticed the room emptying, but when Dopheld looked up they were alone.

He wondered if the doors were locked.

Hux gave no sign on his face that he’d noticed anything at all. The fact that he dropped the same screw three times in close succession was just a coincidence.

“Hello again,” Lady Qi said, that oddly knowing smile on her face again. 

She’d taken her coat off now, her sharply cut, copper coloured clothes almost glowing in the dim fire light. She looked too perfectly put together for this planet of rain and mists and moss. An urban woman out of place.

There was a blaster strapped to her thigh. Dopheld vaguely recognised it as an S-195, practically an antique. An invisible hand brushed over his shoulder towards it, and in that moment he suddenly became aware that he was staring at her in silence.

“Hello,” Dopheld said, his voice cracking like a frightened cadet. “Thank you again for your hospitality, we really appreciate it.”

She nodded and let her eyes drift back to Hux. “You’re welcome. I know how it is to be expecting a child in a difficult situation. I understand you’re in need of a medical droid?”

Hux shrugged without looking up. “‘Need’ is too strong a word—the babies are moving fine, I’d just like to know that we’re all well.”

“We... had a more difficult landing that we would have liked.” Dopheld added, carefully avoiding the word ‘crashed’.

“I guessed as much from the parts you ordered,” Lady Qi said. Her smile was turning nervous at the edges. “Fortunately, I’ve brought a medical droid back with me. It should be fully charged by this evening… Babies, you said? I thought you were about to pop but I suppose that means you’ve a while to go yet?”

“Thirteen weeks.” Hux still had his eyes on his work, but his hands were frozen in place.

Dopheld placed a supportive hand on Hux’s back.

“What would you say if I suggested the name Armitage?” She said so quietly it was almost a whisper.

Hux breathed in sharply through his nose but managed to keep his face composed as he replied, “I’d say it's not a good name for a child. I had enough trouble writing ‘Armie’.”

He looked up from his repairs just in time to see Lady Qi’s smile crumble into something close to tears.

“I knew it was you. Even after all these years.” She reached out a hand but Hux pulled back like he feared to be burned. “How did you find your way here after so long?” 

“Entirely by coincidence,” Hux replied, turning to fix Dopheld with a look that clearly said he knew it wasn’t a coincidence at all.

Ben’s hand squeezed Dopheld’s shoulder again. Dopheld wished he could slap him.

“Did you ever look for me?” Hux asked. He’d put down his tools now so that one hand could rest on his belly while the other shifted just enough to test his wrist holster.

With a quick glance of recognition at his gesture Lady Qi shook her head. 

“No. I knew where you were. Your father made it clear that I couldn’t have you back. By the time I’d properly established myself here, you were already rising through the ranks. Your career path didn’t exactly seem like one you’d be willing to give up, certainly not for a mother you hadn’t seen in decades.”

“I suppose I can’t argue with that,” Hux said flatly. “...I wouldn’t have gone with you. The Order told us there was nothing beyond themselves for us.”

His hand traced an unconscious circle down the side of his bump. 

“No more masters.” He added.

“This is how we break our chains,” Qi’ra murmured, seemingly to herself.

“I’m tired,” Hux said. He stood so quickly that he swayed in place for a moment, leaning into the support that Dopheld’s contact with his back still offered him. “Pheld, help me upstairs.”

Dopheld got the message loud and clear. As they headed towards the stairs he tried not to notice how Lady Qi was staring pensively down at the floor.

Hux stopped suddenly. “Did you love him? Brendol I mean.”

The twist of her lips was the only answer to that question.

“I saw to it that he died,” he said. “It wasn’t pleasant.” 

“Good. Whatever you did, he deserved it.”

Hux bit his lip. “I wish I could forget him the way I forgot you. I remember our home in the kitchens, but I have no memory of you. No visual memory at least. Only your voice. I know your voice… The one who arrived with you, the Alpha, Bill—”

“Techie.” Lady Qi said quickly. “His name is Techie now, he doesn’t want to go back to being Bill.”

“And I’m Max,” Hux added. “I have no memory of him at all.”

“He’s your brother—full-blood.” Qi’ra explained quietly. “M wouldn’t let me onboard. Your father tried to have a medical droid cut him out of me, but the ship couldn’t support a pre-term infant in a bacta tank. Not when the war was heading our way. So we stayed. He refused to give you up. I think he saw you as a second chance to live out his dreams.” 

The hand on Hux’s belly tightened reflexively. “More like nightmares.”

Dopheld desperately wanted to wrap his arms around him, but he knew from Hux’s posture that the gesture wouldn’t be welcome.

“The past is gone.” She said. “The future is what matters now.”

For a moment Hux sneered, then seemed to remember himself and nodded sharply. 

“You’ll have to excuse me now, Lady Qi, I’m tired.”

She reached out a hand as if she could touch him across the room, but she didn’t stand to close the gap. Millicent sniffed her fingers thoughtfully.

“Max… you can call me Qi’ra, if you’re not comfortable with—”

Hux turned back towards the stairs. “Thank you, Qi’ra, for the parts we need to repair our ship, and for allowing us to work here until we can go home.”

He didn’t see the way her shoulders fell. 

Dopheld opened his mouth to say something reassuring, then closed it again and picked up Millicent instead. 

“Thank you,” he said with a nod so awkward he felt physically ill. 

* * *

“Is he here?” Hux said, a beat after Dopheld locked the door.

“I don’t know,” Dopheld replied automatically, and turned to find Hux standing so close their noses were almost touching. It must have been a difficult position to hold, given that Millicent and the babies were between then, but Hux’s face was unreadable.

He shouldn’t have said that. He should have asked who Hux meant.

They both knew who he meant.

“Don’t lie to me, Pheld, not now.”

Dopheld got the impression that if he had been anyone else in the galaxy there would have been a knife to his throat. 

“I’m not lying. I can’t usually see him.” He said, somewhat pleased that his voice didn’t tremble. 

“You were talking to him  _ last night _ , I heard you!” Hux all but snarled.

So it hadn’t been Millicent who knocked over the bowls, or if it had been she wasn’t alone at the time. Suddenly Dopheld realised why Ben had been staring over his shoulder for much of the conversation. 

“Did you hear what Ben said?”

“No, I didn’t hear what B… Kylo said,” Hux faltered—both hands coming up to rest on the top of his bump—before his rage rallied itself again. “I heard you though, I heard you giving away our secrets and saying he died for ‘her’ which I have to assume means that awful scavenger, and I heard… I heard—”

“You heard me repeat that he realised he loved you?”

Hux’s face was flushed blotchy red with anger, and something like fear made his expression twist so much more than his usual composure. “I heard that it’s his fault we’re stuck here!”

“It’s also his fault that we’re still alive and the crash wasn’t so bad. He protected you.”

“He tried to kill me!” Hux hissed. “You have no idea what he did to me!!”

“No, I don’t, but I’m not sure you do either,” Dopheld said carefully. “He messed with your memories more than you realise. And I agree that’s not forgivable—trauma is trauma. But he didn’t bring us here with any kind of malicious intent.”

The reply was so cold that Dopheld could have sworn frost formed on the windows. “I don’t give a flying fuck about Kylo Ren’s _ intent. _ ”

Between them Millicent wriggled out of Dopheld’s arms, twisting awkwardly to avoid Hux’s belly. As soon as she landed on the floor she started meowing plaintively. With every cry her tail twitched in irritation.

Dopheld followed her gaze as she looked around the room. 

“ _ Ben _ isn’t here, she’d see him if he were.”

The look of resigned betrayal on Hux’s face made Dopheld’s heart hurt. He stumbled over to his nest, and sank down onto the cushions without a word. 

After running a lap of the room, Millicent tried to nuzzle his hand but Hux pushed her away.

“I can’t even trust my own cat....” He muttered as he scrubbed his hands over his face, before running them back over his hair and down his neck. His fingers faltered at the bite mark Dopheld had left there. 

“I’m sorry.” There wasn’t much else Dopheld could say.

Hux sighed. “I want to trust you, Pheld, but you have to start telling me the truth. How long has he been following us?”

“Since he died, I think. On Exegol. He said he didn’t know you were pregnant until he found himself on our ship.” Dopheld could barely hear himself over the hammering of his own heart. “He only told me that last night, I didn’t know anything about it then.” 

“So you couldn’t see him?” 

“No.” Dopheld said, then corrected himself. “Well, before we came  _ here _ I only saw him once, heard him once, read a message he left… I thought I was going insane. I couldn’t prove what was going on, and I didn’t want to frighten you.” Dopheld cringed a little at Hux’s disapproving expression. “Then he saved us from those pirates, and protected the babies during the crash. He wrote to me again the first night we came here—he told me it was safe. I swear last night was our first real face-to-face conversation. I had to be drunk for it to work though.”

“Drinking was often a requirement for talking to Kylo,” Hux said, mostly to himself, before he went on. “Why can you see him and I can’t? Are you a secret Jedi?”

Breaking eye contact to stare at his shoes, Dopheld shrugged. “I didn’t think so.”

“Didn’t? Past tense?”

“You know how Kylo could pull a person across a room with his mind? I can move a tiny ball of foil about an inch.” He felt ridiculous even admitting that much. “I know it’s not exactly a transferable skill.”

Without looking up, Dopheld could still sense the weight of Hux’s sneer. 

“I feel like I hardly know you. How long have you had that ability?”

“Since my birthday.” Dopheld couldn’t help smiling at the memory of how happy he’d been that day. “You were sleeping on me in the cockpit and I dropped a glass bottle cap. I instinctively caught it without touching it, so it wouldn’t wake you.”

“You just told me you can’t move more than—”

“I know. Apparently the more emotion I feel the more I can do. Even with intense fear I couldn’t see Ben for more than a second or two.”

“What emotion were you feeling on your birthday that was strong enough to give you powers?” Hux baffled.

Dopheld looked up to meet Hux’s eye. He had to know how he felt.

“Love.” He said. “Joy. Contentment. Peace like I’d never thought possible. As I said, you were sleeping on me—you, the only Omega I’ve ever wanted—with our children safe inside you and a universe full of possibilities stretched out around us. Honestly I wouldn’t have been surprised if I’d suddenly grown wings.”

“That would have been an even less useful—”

A metallic rap at the door cut the thought short. 

“I’ve brought the medical droid to assess the spherical one,” K8 said through the door. 

“Don’t make me reprogram you!” Hux shouted back, but didn’t move from his place against the wall. Instead he looked at Dopheld.

“Do you want to see the droid right now?” He asked.

“No, but I will.”

“Thank you,” Dopheld nodded. “May I stay? I didn’t get the chance to see them last time.”

Hux stared at him for so long that K8 knocked on the door again.

“Fine.” He said at last. “We still need to talk though. Me and you. And him, eventually. I need to think.”

He waved a hand, signalling that Dopheld should unlock the door while he stood to pull his shirt off. 

Much to Dopheld’s disappointment, he turned his back to do so. 

* * *

Dopheld sat in a dark corner of the bar with a glass of something non-alcoholic that Traveller had called ‘invigorating’ and the hologram of the twins playing on repeat in front of him. He’d left Hux to shower in privacy—the examination had rattled him a little and it wouldn’t have been fair to add to his stress.

The holo flickered and restarted at the beginning again.

That image—of Med sucking their fingers as they slept, while Min wriggled happily below—might have been his single most treasured possession, even if it was framed by the shadows of Hux’s broken ribs. 

At least one damaged rib had fused out of place, another seemed to have come adrift from its other half. At least some surgery would be needed once the children were born. The droid had said that the situation was still stable enough to wait, but Dopheld wasn’t sure he trusted that. 

Apparently there was a deficit of trust in the air today. 

“H-hi,” a soft Correllian accent shook him out of that gloomy thought. “Are those your children?” 

Looking up, Dopheld found Techie standing by the table holding a steaming bowl of stew against his chest. His eyes audibly whirred as he stared at the hologram. He was alone.

“Yes. They haven’t been born yet.” Dopheld felt foolish even as the words came out of his mouth. Talk about stating the obvious.

Techie nodded. “It’d be hard to miss how big he is. Your Mate I mean. Congratulations, they look… uh appropriately baby shaped.”

Well, even if the phrasing was awkward he wasn’t wrong. The droid had said that both babies were in perfect health for their respective ages, and all the usual limbs and organs were in the right places. 

Sliding a little way along the bench to give Techie space to sit down, Dopheld smiled.

“Thank you, I’m looking forward to meeting them.”

By the way Techie looked at the seat beside him a passerby might think he was staring at a bear trap. 

“Do you, uh, know who he is?” Dopheld asked as the silence dragged uncomfortably on. He wasn’t sure if Hux wanted Techie to know there were brothers, and he really didn’t know how to ask without giving that fact away.

“Do I know who he is to  _ me _ , or d-do I know who he is?” Techie replied. The sound of his eyes moving seemed like the only noise in the room. 

Apparently Techie saw something in the way Dopheld set his jaw, and finally sat down.

“The answer is yes, to both, I know who he is,” he said as he poked at the stew with his spoon. “My mother told me. W-we always talked about him. When I was young. Before I was taken away. I used to dream about my handsome, clever brother finding me. Setting me free. Sending ships to destroy Peach Trees. That was a long time ago though. I grew out of that.”

“I’m so sorry that happened to you. Did Matt rescue you?”

Techie ducked his head. “Yeah, he really did.”

“That’s good.”

“He really is,” Techie said softly. “I won’t say anything to Matt, or anyone else. I never had a father. I’m glad your children will get to have both parents around. And each other. I-I guess I’m going to be an uncle?”

“If you want to be, I think that would be okay.” Dopheld wasn’t entirely sure that would be true, but he made the offer in the hope that it could come true.

“I’d like that.”

* * *

Hux was asleep again by the time Dopheld made it back to their room. Millicent greeted him at the door with a grumpy mew. Whether Ben was there too he couldn’t tell.

He’d talked with Techie for far longer than he’d intended, mostly about the repairs they needed to do on the Orange Feline, and sights they’d seen. Techie had offered his skills—and Matt’s strength—towards the rebuilding efforts, in exchange for an introduction to Fonre. It seemed the couple weren’t enjoying the cold damp Arkanis atmosphere. Not that anyone  _ did _ enjoy it.

“Pheld?” Hux muttered.

“Sorry, did I wake you?” He’d thought he was undressing quietly for bed, but maybe he’d been too caught up in his own thoughts.

“No, Min started kicking up a storm,” Hux said, sounding a little more awake. He rolled onto his back with a groan. “I think they missed you.”

“I’ve missed all three of you.”

Somewhere near his ankles Millicent meowed.

Hux chuckled.

“Okay,” Dopheld said with faux frustration. “I’ve missed all four of you.”

Millicent rubbed her face across his shin.

“Where have you been?” There wasn’t any accusation in Hux’s tone but Dopheld felt his shoulders tense all the same.

“Talking to Techie,” he said, determined to be entirely honest this time. “He, uh, knows who you are, but it doesn’t matter to him. He’s had a rough decade himself. But he’s offered to help us with the ship repairs, in exchange for a transportation sometime. I said I’d ask.”

“Do you trust him?”

Dopheld shrugged. “I’m not sure my judgement can be relied on, but I think so. I trust Matt.”

Hux hummed quietly in the dark.

“Come sleep over here,” he said, just when Dopheld had just made up his mind to sleep on the empty bed. “I don’t think the babies can settle without you.”

He didn’t need to be asked twice. 


	14. Chapter 14

Dopheld had never truly envied another Alpha’s relationship until he saw Matt effortlessly carrying Techie across the treacherous parts of the moorland like he weighed almost nothing. Which given Hux’s own build was probably close to the truth, and of course he wouldn’t ever expect Hux to carry him anywhere, but still—Dopheld would have loved not to be knee deep in mud and other things that went squelch.

Alas, he was going to have to get used to it.

The first time Matt had lifted Techie over a ditch, K8 had walked right past Dopheld and said flatly, “I don’t like you that much.”

At least he didn’t have to worry about Hux struggling to get to the ship this time. 

There had been some debate about how Hux would supervise the work—since ‘delegation’ had rarely featured in his vocabulary—but Techie had eventually convinced him that he could be trusted to run things. That had been a strange conversation to watch, like Hux had been interviewing himself.

By all accounts, Techie had never worked on a HWK-series freighter himself, but he had practically been the nervous system of a space station for several years so he’d encountered enough to be familiar with them. 

Whether it was a genetic similarity between the siblings or just a coincidence of their upbringing, they both had almost innate skills when it came to technology. 

Any question or alternate scenario Hux could think of, Techie had an answer. Sometimes even before Hux had finished speaking. He was more than competent to manage what would probably be a three week process to repair the ship, and even thought he could take a week off that time if they stayed on site. 

Dopheld still wasn’t sure about that part. He’d agreed because Hux wanted to get off Arkanis as fast as possible, but he wasn’t sure the Alpha in him would let him stay away.

The sensible part of his mind kept reminding him that it was best if Hux stayed at the inn, where he would be warm, dry, and hopefully safe. He had Traveller and Qi’ra on hand if he needed anything, and Dopheld assumed Ben would keep an eye on him too regardless of Hux’s wishes on that front. 

It was the best Dopheld could hope for. That, and maybe a break in the rain.

* * *

The rain didn’t stop, but for the most part, it didn’t matter. K8 was well waterproofed for a droid, and so depressing to be around that the humans unanimously decided to give her most of the outdoor work. 

Inside the ship Dopheld often found himself working alone too. 

He’d always liked Matt, and Techie was almost invisible when he wasn’t speaking, but when they were together… perhaps the problem was the enclosed space, or the fact that the Orange Feline was  _ his _ home, or maybe the First Order hadn’t included many love matches—whatever the reason, the smell of them together set his teeth on edge. 

Until now he’d thought that ‘sickeningly romantic’ was a turn of phrase, but after the third or fourth time he’d walked in on them kissing he’d had to lock himself in the cockpit to keep his temper and his food down. 

It was only that night—when he was reading through his datapad of pregnancy research as a form of distraction—that he realised they were technically inside his Mate’s nest. Because all of their ship was their home, not just the bunk they’d been filling with blankets. Of course, Hux wasn’t there but the addition of another couple still set Dopheld’s Alpha on edge.

He wanted to clean everything they’d touched, and make them sleep outside where they couldn’t keep sullying Hux’s things with their scent. 

And he kept both of those things to himself because he wasn’t a braindead Alpha ruled by his hormones. 

Matt was his friend.

Techie was Hux’s brother. 

They were both giving up their time and skills to help them.

It would be rude to send them outside, or clean up after them where they might notice. 

Instead Dopheld moved himself into the bunk that Hux had been slowly turning into a pillow fortress for months, and tried to breathe in as much of his scent as he could. 

* * *

A hand tapped him on the shoulder. 

Dopheld rolled over and pulled the blanket over his head. The alarm hadn’t gone off yet, so there was still time for more sleep before he had to be on the bridge. Whatever his roommate wanted—it could wait.

This time a finger poked him in the cheek, which really shouldn’t have been possible without moving the fabric.

Across the room someone snored, and another person shushed them.

His brain finally caught up with the situation.

He was curled up in Hux’s nesting alcove onboard the Orange Feline. Rain was thundering on the roof but doing nothing to drown out Matt’s snuffling. The crackle of K8 soldering wires echoed through from the cargo hold. Ben prodded him in the side of the head.

“Okay, I’m awake,” Dopheld said so quietly there was barely a sound even in the confines of his blanket. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Ben’s words appeared in his mind without involving his ears. 

Dopheld had already suspected that—since Ben would have been less polite if there had been an actual emergency—but he still didn’t appreciate being worried for no reason. Hux was approaching the point when the babies could arrive at any time, but while Med was now at the relatively safer age of thirty-two weeks, Min was only at twenty-seven. The survival rates at that age weren’t wonderful without proper medical support. 

“If nothing is wrong, then surely you could have waited until morning?” Dopheld snapped, pulling the blanket tighter across his face to highlight the rhetorical nature of the question.

Whether Ben failed to get the hint or just didn’t care, it was hard to tell but he kept talking anyway.

“Hux has been talking to his mother,” Ben said, in a tone that suggested Hux had also grown two extra arms as well. “Actually talking. For hours.”

“Good.”

Although Ben wasn’t visible, Dopheld recognised the silence of someone who was awkwardly loitering in hope of a conversation. 

“Was there anything else?” He asked when Ben failed to speak. “Some of us still have to sleep, you know.”

“He hates me.” 

There was so much sullen dejection in those words that Dopheld almost felt bad for him. Almost.

“Understandable.”

“I want…”

Dopheld had to resist the urge to pull the pillow up around his ears. That would be childish, and it wouldn’t actually help block his voice out. “What you want really doesn’t matter anymore, Ben. You’re dead.”

“But Hux should know—”

“I won’t talk to you about him when he isn’t here.” He snapped. “I appreciate you letting me know they’re all okay, but please, go away and let me sleep.”

“You can’t keep pushing me away forever, you’re going to need my guidance when they’re older.”

This time Dopheld rolled onto his front so his face was buried in his pillow. “Pretty sure we won’t.”

“One of them has—”

“SHUT UP AND LET ME SLEEP.”

There was a snort of surprise from the other side of the room, followed by a muffled ‘sry’.

Dopheld probably should have heard Ben out, but in that moment he really was just too tired to care.

* * *

Sixteen days after they left The Red Sky In Mourning Inn—and five days after the last time Ben deigned to speak to him—they returned cold and exhausted, but triumphant. 

The Orange Feline was in better condition than it had ever been since it first rolled off the Correllian Engineering production line decades ago, though they’d deliberately left the exterior looking shabby. Hopefully, no one would be interested in stealing a ship that appeared to be in poor condition.

Dopheld parked the ship on a small rise behind the Inn, where he hoped Hux would notice it from their room.

Instead he found Hux sitting by the fire with Qi’ra in the main room, apparently enjoying a cup of warm tea and actually—genuinely—laughing. 

It was such a surprising development that Dopheld had to stop to check that Techie was still behind him and not impersonating his Mate. Not that he could imagine Techie laughing like that either. 

He hated himself that his next thought was to wonder if the tea was drugged, but Hux had survived enough assassination attempts from younger officers that it was unlikely he’d ever fall for that.

When Hux finally noticed him standing in the door and smiled at him, Dopheld had to admit that he did seem naturally happy. Like he’d been when they were younger, before Kylo Ren ruined everything for a while. 

“You’re back early!” Hux said. He made no effort to stand up, but Millicent ran over to sniff at Dopheld’s boots like a very small bodyguard. “Is it good news or bad?”

“It’s finished,” Techie replied as he squeezed past Dopheld and crossed to the fireplace where he climbed up onto the stone surround like a very large cat. 

Dopheld stepped forward out of Matt’s way, realising he’d stopped dead in the doorway like a love struck idiot. 

Hux didn’t just look happy, he looked  _ well _ , with colour in his cheeks that hadn’t really been there since Starkiller Base was destroyed. 

“You’re dripping rainwater on my floor,” K8 said, shoving him none too kindly towards the fire as she closed the door behind them all. “Either get dry or get out.” 

“If it isn’t our very own ray of sunshine,” Traveller muttered in greeting, though he was smiling through the sarcasm. 

It felt wrong somehow to intrude on this scene—the staff bickering at the bar, Matt brushing out Techie’s hair by the fire, Hux sitting neatly opposite his mother—but then Millicent stood on her hind legs to mew at him, and the feeling vanished as quickly as it appeared.

“Are you okay, Pheld?” Hux said, the smile turned to a more familiar frown. “You don’t look right.”

“I’m just tired,” Dopheld replied. He nodded towards Matt. “He snores like that time a dianoga got caught in the waste disposal airlocks.”

He hadn’t noticed how stressed he was until he was back inside this building, with Hux’s scent fresh in the air. Living together as they had for all those months Dopheld had barely noticed the calm that came from having his pregnant Mate’s scent at the back of his throat, but now he was realising how tense he’d been during the two weeks he’d been without it. 

All his muscles were trying to unwind all at once. He felt almost dizzy as a result. 

“Well, we should get you upstairs then.”

Dopheld should have gone over to help Hux stand—his centre of balance had shifted forward again—but by the time he’d had that thought Hux was already beside him, holding his arm.

“We, we should show you the ship,” he said weakly, already leaning into Hux’s space.

“Tomorrow.”

They were in their room before Dopheld had entirely registered them climbing the stairs, but then Hux had him pressed back against the door with his hands in his hair and his belly trapped between them, and how they got upstairs absolutely didn’t matter any more.

His lips tasted amazing. The room smelled amazing. The kicking and wriggling of their babies against his ribs felt amazing.

“You’re amazing,” Dopheld murmured when Hux finally came up to breath.

Hux chuckled slightly, somehow pressing closer to push his nose against the scars on Dopheld’s neck.

“I mean it, ‘amazing’ is the only word for you,” Dopheld said. His hands were roaming over Hux’s belly of their own accord, mapping out how much he’d changed in so short a time.

Hux snorted. “Amazingly huge.”

“Amazingly perfect.” Dopheld corrected.

Shaking his head, Hux leaned back just enough to mock glare at Dopheld, a look that was immediately undermined by his blush and the size of his pupils.

“You’re only saying tha—”

“Because I love you.”

“—because I’m pregnant.”

“Hmmm, no,” Dopheld said, pretending to think about that for a moment. “No, you’ll still be perfect when you’re not pregnant too. You always have been perfect.”

“Ha,” Hux replied, his expression fighting to shift into a reflexive sneer. “Clearly you’re delirious with exhaustion, so we should get you to bed.” 

There was a lot there that Dopheld could have argued with, but he was being kissed again, Hux felt wonderful in his arms, and the siren song of a quiet bed that smelled like home was enough to keep him quiet. 

* * *

As impossible as it seemed, Hux had apparently missed Dopheld even more than Dopheld had missed him.

“I know the saying is ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder’ but there should be a second part for Omegas, so we can avoid this kind of embarrassing display of neediness,” Hux murmured into the pillow beneath his head. 

Dopheld rubbed soothing circles over his belly and buried his nose into the nape of Hux’s neck. He didn’t know what to say to that.

They were tied back-to-chest by Dopheld’s knot, the only position that was really comfortable anymore thanks to Hux’s size, though Hux had made a spirited attempt at several others. He had seemed driven by more than pure affection—as he had been during his heat—but if his satisfaction made them both happy after the weeks apart, wasn’t it a good thing?

“I barely even said hello to you,” Hux went on, “and you wanted to show me the ship.”

“I doubt we’d have made it to our bunk before you were tearing my clothes off,” Dopheld murmured between the kisses he was trailing down Hux’s shoulder. “Not that I mind, it’s a relief to smell right again.”

Hux hummed and rubbed his face against Dopheld’s wrist where it was trapped under him by their position. “Same, though I have to admit the urge to get you in bed has been rising in almost direct correlation with your clothes losing their scent. I haven’t much enjoyed these nights on my own. Hopefully we’ve sufficiently scratched both those itches now.”

“Unlikely, most of what I’ve read suggests it’ll get worse.”

“Which part?”

“Both—that’s why Omegas nest, the scent keeps you calm and the…”

“Lust? Wanton depravity? Uncontrolled desire?” 

Dopheld could feel the warmth of Hux’s blush everywhere their skin touched. 

“Yes, that.” He said as matter of factly as he could. “That’s getting your body ready for—”

“Please stop talking. I do not want to think about that, right now. Or ever.”

“You’ll have to eventually.”

“I know that!” Hux snapped, then sighed. “Just let me enjoy having you back.”

“Okay.” 

Under Dopheld’s hand Hux’s bump was almost still, as if the babies were asleep inside him. It was a wonderfully calming sensation.

Breathing deep Dopheld could feel himself drifting off despite his knot still twitching occasionally.

“I’m sorry if… all this… was too much,” Hux muttered, breaking the silence. “I should have…”

“Shhh. You’re my Mate, I love you, and I don’t mind.”

Again they fell quiet, again sleep seemed to be running its fingertips through Dopheld’s mind.

“I spoke to my mother,” Hux said, quietly as if he wasn’t sure he wanted a reply. He hadn’t used that name for Qi’ra in conversation before.

“I noticed. You both seem happy.”

Hux shifted back a little so his hand was resting on Dopheld’s hip, his thumb drawing small circles pensively across his skin as he spoke. 

“We have the same sense of humour, and similar taste in weapons. She wasn’t the woman I thought she was when I was a child—she was so much more than a kitchen maid. Believe it or not, she trained in techniques to combat Force users, and worked under a former-Sith for a while. She came to Arkanis as a spy. I was a side effect on that mission, so was my brother, but her life was doing whatever was necessary to stay alive. I can respect that.”

“I’m glad you’ve found some common ground with her.”

“I feel like I have more chance of being a decent parent now I’ve spoken to her.”

Dopheld frowned. He’d never been concerned about Hux in that regard. “You were always good with the children in the fleet, why would you doubt yourself?”

“Because having the First Order at my back is different to making it on our own,” Hux sighed again, and interlaced his free hand with Dopheld’s fingers where they were still resting on his belly. “These are ours. They won’t be going back to the academy after an hour or two of genial banter. An inspirational speech won’t help when they can’t even sit up… But as long as I can keep us all alive, that should be enough.”

“Absolutely.”

Staying alive was all anyone could ask for in this galaxy.

* * *

It became clear very quickly after their reunion that they couldn’t stay at the Inn any longer. They were both on edge when they weren’t together—Dopheld found himself snapping at the others for being in the common areas, and Hux spent less time outside their room.

There was no reason for them to be uneasy inside the building when they could move back into the familiar privacy of the Orange Feline, though Dopheld was right about Hux’s reaction to the scent of other humans around the ship.

Dopheld had never been naked on so many surfaces in his life, nor had he felt the need to clean so badly since Hux had gone into heat. 

At least Hux had settled for them simply sitting or laying naked together most of the time, since carrying the babies was leaving him increasingly exhausted. 

Even the wildest libido couldn’t overcome that kind of work.

* * *

The rain was the final factor in their decision to leave Arkanis.

For a few days they’d felt secure in their ship, but as the novelty wore off the patter of water on the hull became oppressive. 

Mist and the rivulets of water over the viewports hid those approaching the ship until it would be too late to fend off an attack. It didn’t matter that the only people who came to see them were friends and family—the possibility remained. 

The thought wasn’t entirely rational, but few things were when it came to nesting. The babies were thirty-four and twenty-nine weeks. Time was running out. They had to be ready.

They’d both spent decades in space, and that was where they felt safest. 

Qi’ra didn’t cry when she said goodbye to Armitage this time, though she held him for several minutes longer than perhaps she should have done. Hux might have cried, but he didn’t admit to it.

Traveller gave them gifts from the whole household, and K8 insisted they weren’t from her, even the pair of toy security droids that ‘someone’ had carefully made from wood.

Dopheld promised to come back once the babies were born, to see them all, and to take Techie and Matt off planet if they still wanted to leave by then. 

Millicent was perhaps the least willing of all of them to say goodbye. She’d become used to half a dozen laps to nap in, a fire to snooze beside, and an endless supply of vermin to consume. In the end, Dopheld had to wrap her in his coat to get her out of the building.

She refused to acknowledge him for a week in protest at his treatment of her. Even when he filled her food bowl for her. 

* * *

“Is he here?” Hux asked suddenly, startling Dopheld upright from where he’d been idly researching Omega birth advice on his datapad. He’d assumed Hux was asleep beside him, a habit he’d developed after almost every meal now that Med was at thirty-seven weeks and every step was an effort. 

The question was so unexpected that Dopheld’s mouth almost asked ‘who?’ before his brain interceded and probably saved him a lot of grief. 

There was only one ‘he’ that Hux could be talking about now that the ship contained only the two of them and Millicent. Why Hux wanted to talk to him now Dopheld couldn’t guess.

“I uh… don’t know,” Dopheld answered honestly, looking around what he could see of the living area from inside the alcove. He sat up with his back against the long wall, crossing his legs neatly out of the way when Hux pushed himself up against the pillows.

Millicent mewed in quiet objection of her nap being interrupted, then the sound twisted into a meow of greeting as she fixed her eyes on something at the other end of the mattress.

It had been a couple of weeks since Dopheld last spoke to Ben. They hadn’t ended things on a happy note. A weird blend of guilt, fear and Alpha bravado made Dopheld’s heart hammer against his ribs. 

Breathing deeply, he tried his best to harness that feeling. 

A shadowy blue figure coalesced by Hux’s feet.

“I guess he is here,” Dopheld said, locking eyes with Ben.

The confidence Ben had emanated during that late night drunken encounter wasn’t visible here. He sat with his legs stretched out alongside Hux’s own, but his arms were wrapped around his torso as if he was hugging himself. 

Hux watched open mouthed as Millicent rubbed her face against one ghostly knee.

“He’s there, isn’t he?” He asked, pointing almost as Ben.

“You still can’t see him?”

“No, but it feels like Med did a flip just to turn in that direction, and Millie…” Hux huffed hard through his nose. “What does he look like?”

That wasn’t a question Dopheld was particularly comfortable answering, but he did his best. “Blue, mostly. There are no wounds or injuries. He’s as I remember him, though there's no scar on his face.”

“He can hear you too,” Ben said quietly.

“Can you hear him?” Dopheld asked, not entirely understanding Ben’s comment. 

Ben rolled his eyes while Hux shook his head. 

Dopheld turned his face towards Ben properly. “Sorry, that was a complaint, wasn’t it?” Turning back to Hux, he added. “He’s offended that we were talking about him as if he couldn’t hear us.”

“Well, he shouldn’t be invisible and inaudible then.” Hux replied, in the snippy tone of a man who’d psyched himself up for a conversation only to immediately lose control of it.

Ben sighed. “The Force doesn’t work like that.”

“I don’t think there’s anything we can do to help you see or hear him,” Dopheld said. This conversation was already one of the most awkward experiences of his life, and it had barely started yet.

“Can you speak for him, Pheld? Please?” Hux looked at him with what was probably the closest he’d ever got to a pleading look. “I want to know what Ben did to me. I assume I don’t need you to relay that to him? Just the answer? I don’t want him to change anything now, I just want to know exactly what he did to my mind.”

Before Dopheld could say anything, Ben said, “I can hear you just fine. I used the Force to tell you that you couldn’t remember the good times we had, replaced them with other events, and then reminded you of them again.”

Dopheld frowned. “Okay, I’m going to repeat what he says word for word or else this is going to get very confusing.”

“How often?” Hux asked once he’d heard what Ben had to say. “It can’t have been just once.”

“Everytime. More than weekly, sometimes daily.”

“You rewound and rerecorded my memories over and over, for months?” Hux sounded stricken though his expression was turning blank. “Why?”

“I…” Ben tipped his head back against the bulkhead and stared at the ceiling. “It seemed like the only way to be Supreme Leader and have what I wanted.”

“A sex slave?” Hux was looking down at his stomach, his eyes almost hidden by his golden lashes. Dopheld took his hand. “I remember the bruises, so which was real? The shy flyboy in the gym, or the uncaring Alpha in my quarters? Or is the truth even worse?”

“It was  _ all _ true. Don’t pretend you don’t have fetishes of your own. I know that Dopheld knows about the rope-play, whether you indulge in it with him or not.” Ben snapped, and Dopheld felt sick repeating his own name with Ben’s words. “I wanted it all. I wanted you to fight and rail at me like you did before Starkiller was destroyed, and I wanted you to love me  _ for me _ . Snoke was finally gone. I could be who I really was, but I didn’t know who I was!” 

Ben was shaking now, his hands clawing at his sides as if he wanted to tear through his shirt. “I had no idea who I was because it was all a lie.  _ I  _ was all a lie. Not me and you, just me. Ben, Kylo, Leia’s son, Vader’s grandson, ‘Master of the Knights of Ren’, ‘Supreme Leader of the First Order’—none of those people existed. I was just Palpatine’s puppet. You were the only thing that was real in my life, until I broke you.”

“It doesn’t sound to me like I was ever real either.” Hux said. “You had an idea of me, or more than one, and you tried to make me fit into that. I hate trying to remember that year, the more I think about it, the less sense it makes, like looking at an optical illusion for so long it becomes nothing but shapes.”

“I’m sorry.”

Hux bared his teeth in a sneer that was almost a snarl. “Being sorry doesn’t help.”

“I know.”

In the silence that followed Hux twisted his hand around in Dopheld’s so their fingers were interlaced, and squeezed tightly.

“I think I loved ‘Ben’,” he said quietly, still staring at his belly. “Whether he was real or not, the memories were good. He gave me Millicent… was that real?”

He looked up at where Millie was still trying her best to wind around ghostly legs she could barely interact with properly.

Ben nodded, his bottom lip held tight between his teeth in a futile effort to hold back tears.

“Yes,” Dopheld translated around the lump in his own throat.

“I choose to believe he gave me this child too—whatever the circumstances really were—and I intend for them to be loved to the best of my ability,” Hux went on. “Kylo, I know I hated, though maybe there was a fondness there before Starkiller fell. We brought out the worst in one another, and sometimes there’s a strength in that. But I won’t ever tell my child about him. Or what we were. Any of us. Two new lives— _ all _ new lives. Do you understand? Both of you?”

Dopheld locked eyes with Ben as they both nodded. “He understands.”

“I don’t want my memories back,” Hux said, “I don’t want you to fix what you did because I do not want you to spoil what I have now. You’re dead. I can’t see, or hear, or feel you. Dopheld is alive, I love him, and I’d trust him with my life even if he hasn’t always told me the truth. But we can’t ever be free of you because one of these children is yours. So what do we do now?”

Ben leant forward and stared at Hux for a long moment. Shifting onto his knees he reached out towards the swell of his belly.

Without thinking Dopheld stopped him with a hand to his chest, and was shocked when—for a moment—he felt the weight of Ben pressed against his palm.

Hux only looked confused.

“I won’t harm them,” Ben said, but Dopheld didn’t move. “I won’t harm any of them, I can’t change his memories again, not any more.”

“Then what do you think you’re doing?”

Ben sat back, both hands held up as if he wanted to seem harmless. “I want to feel them, with his permission.”

Dopheld relayed the request to Hux, who sat up a little more, and shifted his own hand off the lower edge of his belly.

“Fine.”

The instant Ben’s hands touched Hux’s skin, Dopheld felt his own heart clench. He placed his own hands onto the same places, unable to let another Alpha—even a dead one—touch his Mate without making a stand.

Hux frowned at him, but said nothing.

“You feel different,” Dopheld said while Ben only sat staring in silence.

“I know, something moved and woke me up,” Hux replied, his own hand clenching.

“You should have said! Are you in labour?”

“How the pfassk should I know? I’ve never done this before.”

“He isn’t,” Ben said, cutting off the argument before it could really develop. “But the little one has moved into position, so it probably won’t be long.”

“How do you know what position they should be in?” Dopheld asked. He felt vaguely guilty that Ben had recognised that before he did.

“I’ve been reading the same articles as you, it’s easy enough to read over your shoulder.”

“And that’s creepy.”

Hux slapped Dopheld on the arm. Fear probably made the blow a little more forceful than necessary. “Can I remind you both that I can’t hear him? What’s going on?”

“It’s okay.” He tried to sound as reassuring as possible over the rising guilt. “But Min has moved into the birth position, so there’s not long left.”

“Fuck,” Hux sighed, with feeling.

Dopheld couldn’t disagree.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check out my twitter Hux_Gen for some wonderful art by Squire.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you have any baby related triggers you might want to check out the notes at the end of the chapter.

As often as Dopheld had read the documents he’d downloaded all those months ago, it seemed that at least half the information hadn’t actually made it into his brain. Whether that was from stress or distractions, or just plain overload he didn’t know, and Hux didn’t care. 

Whatever the reason, Hux was mad at him for not knowing that first babies often moved into position weeks before they were actually born. 

Now, Dopheld rather felt that as an Omega this was something Hux should probably have known as well, but he wasn’t going to say that out loud. That would be asking for trouble. 

Ten days had passed since their awkward three-way conversation with no sign of the babies’ arrival, and Hux had started walking laps of the cargo hold out of nervous anticipation. 

There wasn’t anything else they could do to prepare. 

The nest could only be rearranged so many times, though Hux had moved more towels into the fresher as well. With Min sitting so low against his hips he was spending as much time in there as anywhere else. 

All the while Millicent trotted diligently along at his heels like a fluffy nursemaid. 

By comparison Dopheld felt rather useless now. They’d moved the Orange Feline into a safe orbit near the planet they’d both felt most comfortable on; he’d made contact with Fonre to let him know they were alright and looking forward to returning to work once they could; he’d cleaned everything in the ship until Hux had threatened to throw his brushes in the airlock if he didn’t sit still. 

All he could do was wait, and practice moving little scraps of things with his mind. It wasn’t much, but it was all he had.

Ben, if he was around, stayed silent. 

* * *

It was Millicent who realised what was happening first.

They were all in the kitchenette, Dopheld sitting at the counter while Hux stood beside him with his hands lightly gripping the edge and staring blankly at the sink, when she started meowing in a tone Dopheld didn’t recognise.

“What’s wrong, sweetie?” Hux asked. He tried to look down at where she was winding around his ankles, but his bump mostly blocked the view. 

Still making the same strange noise she stood on her hind legs between them and gently batted at his waist before twisting her head to look at Dopheld. 

“Millie? What’s wrong?” Dopheld repeated, feeling a little foolish at asking questions of a cat. 

Hux had moved his hand to his side with a frown. 

When neither of them did anything to make things clearer, Dopheld tried again. “Are you okay?”

“I think they’re coming,” Hux said weakly. He grabbed one of Dopheld’s hands and pressed it against his belly. A few seconds later the muscles under his skin tightened. “It doesn’t hurt, but something’s happening.”

Over the sound of his heart thundering in his ears Dopheld asked, “Okay, where do you want to be?” 

There was a pause as Hux looked between the short flight of stairs into the sleeping quarters where his nest was waiting, and the refresher at the back of the cargo hold. 

“I can help you if you need to move again later,” Dopheld suggested. He had carried Hux to the refresher during his heat after all, and in the moment he felt like he’d be able to do that again.

Hux twisted his lips together in irritated indecision. 

His cheeks were turning pink.

“It would be easier to clean the ‘fresher than rebuild…”

“Don’t worry about cleaning, I can do--”

“I don’t want you away from me for long,” Hux blurted suddenly, the pink now the deep hot red of embarrassment. “But I don’t want you to see… fuck.” He was staring down at his hands now, the knuckles turning white where he was gripping the countertop.

“Not all that long ago I thought I’d seen you dead, I swear I won’t judge you for a natural mess.”

Hux sighed, and tried to smooth his hair back from his face, but instead he buckled at the knees as soon as he let go of the counter. Dopheld had an arm around his middle before either of them realised what was happening. At their feet Millicent started wailing again.

“The refresher is closer,” Hux said, and put one of his own arms around Dopheld’s shoulders. “Get us there, please.”

* * *

There wasn’t much space in the refresher to move around. 

Whether it was some kind of genetic memory, or the intense scent of his Mate, Dopheld found the closeness of the walls reassuring. Despite his concern for Hux it was as if they were safer there. 

Hux had stripped as soon as they got through the doors, throwing his clothes irritably into the shower cubicle followed by Dopheld’s shirt which he’d demanded without eye contact. As he threw the towels in there one by one in some enigmatic Omega design, Dopheld settled on the floor just outside the shower, and tried not to worry about the liquid running down the inside of Hux’s thighs. 

He had to assume that if Hux’s waters breaking was a concern then Hux would have mentioned it.

Beside him, from her own position sitting primly on the toilet, Millicent rubbed her face against Dopheld’s cheek and purred deeply. 

For an hour or so that was the only noise.

Inside the shower cubicle Hux had built himself a pile of fabric against a corner so he could half-crouch half-lean against it with his back pressed against the wall itself. He’d draped Dopheld’s shirt around his shoulders as both protection against the cold and something to breathe against during the worst part of each contraction.

Dopheld wondered a little guiltily whether he as the Alpha should be the thing Hux was leaning against for support, but he trusted Hux to ask for what he needed. 

“How do you feel?” He asked when Hux tipped his head back with an odd sigh.

“Like I’m running a marathon standing still but every few minutes my body decides to sprint whether I want it to or not,” Hux replied, then smiled wryly. “There are any number of other--much cruder--things I could compare it to, but I’d like to keep a little dignity.”

“Does it hurt?”

“Not yet, it's… pressure. And stretch. I know you’ve never been fucked but it's not dissimilar to the early stages of-- Ahhh… Okay, maybe I spoke too soon.” The last few words were said through gritted teeth. 

“What do you need?”

“You. Here.”

Keeping his eyes fixed on Hux’s face Dopheld shuffled forward into the cubicle, and knelt where Hux had indicated. The knees of his trousers were instantly soaked with tepid liquid that felt like something between water and slick. Dopheld hardly noticed the discomfort since Hux immediately reached for his hand and placed it between his legs. 

The first baby was crowning. Based on what Ben had said that should be Min, the smallest and least developed of the two. Theoretically that could mean delivery would be easier on Hux, but it would also be harder on the baby.

Dopheld had the sudden overwhelming feeling that he was out of his depth.

An invisible hand squeezed his shoulder.

Remembering that physical contact was at least somewhat reassuring, Dopheld moved forward just enough to rest his free hand on Hux’s waist. As he gently massaged the tense muscles there Hux gave him a grimace that might have been a smile.

Panting like he was running up a mountain, Hux braced harder against the wall and Dopheld’s daughter entered the galaxy in a single sudden rush.

He’d known she would be small but he hadn’t understood just how small. The baby that slithered into his hands was shockingly tiny. She couldn’t have been more than two kilos of delicate limbs and dark hair. 

She was also completely silent. 

And still.

“Pheld?” Hux murmured as he tried to get his breath back.

He had his head tipped against the wall against, gasping at the ceiling so he couldn’t see what Dopheld was doing right then. Later Dopheld would realise that was, perhaps, a deliberate choice.

“It’s okay,” Dopheld said, entirely on autopilot as he gathered her tiny purple body against his bare chest, rubbing her back as he tried to encourage her to breathe. “It’s okay.”

What was he supposed to do?

Airways. That was the first step, he had to make sure her airways were clear. 

He dipped a finger into her mouth. Something was there, just beyond his reach. 

Just as it had all those months ago with the bottle top, the Force leapt to his aid. Something gloopy slapped against his fingertip, followed by warm liquid.

“That’s it,” he murmured while he draped her little form along his arm to help clear her throat and rub her back more firmly. She was warm in his hands but she still needed to breathe.

“Come on, baby, come on, please.” He could hear himself saying that over and over but he couldn’t stop the mantra. 

“Dopheld?” Hux said again, the edge of pain returning to his voice.

“It’s okay.” 

It wasn’t okay. Their daughter wasn’t breathing, she wasn’t moving, and there was nothing he could do.

“You were always a terrible liar,” Hux said quietly, tearing Dopheld’s heart in two.

The hand on his shoulder squeezed so fiercely it almost felt like Ben was trying to break his collarbone. What had Ben said? He had given his life to bring Rey back. 

Dopheld would do that in a heartbeat if he only knew how.

There was nothing he had ever wanted more. He could feel it burning in his chest.

“Please, Ben?” He whispered. “Please, show me how.”

The hand on his shoulder slid around to press against the centre of his back, while the other—massive, transparent, and slightly blue—wrapped around his daughter’s torso.

‘Like this,’ Ben murmured in his ear. ‘Breathe like this.’

“Breathe, baby, please, breathe,” Dopheld said and lent into the feeling flowing through him. It was an indescribable sensation of pain and love and fear, all at once, pouring out of his lungs. Out of every cell in his body.

Her first breath against his skin was as soft and warm as the breeze over the Zephyr festival. 

Her cheeks turned pink.

She breathed in.

She whimpered. It might have been the best sound he’d ever heard in his life.

Dopheld lent back against the shower door frame, waiting for the life to leave him, determined not to let her fall as he died. 

But he didn’t collapse. He breathed in again. So did she.

‘Help him,’ Ben said quietly. Dopheld could see him now, leaning half through the wall into the space between himself and Hux. He looked nervous, his transparent hands shaking as he tried to touch Hux’s sweat soaked hair.

Shifting their daughter to curl over his shoulder, Dopheld reached down with his free hand.

“You’re doing great,” he murmured to Hux, “I’m just going to check… Oh, this one’s nearly here, already. I’m just going to put you down, baby, just for a minute.” 

He placed the little one carefully into a hollow amongst the towels, wrapping the loose edge of one over her gently waving limbs.

Millicent immediately settled into a crescent shape around her like she was her own kitten.

Confident he could trust this unexpected babysitter for a while, he turned his attention back to Hux just in time.

Ben’s child entered the galaxy screaming before she was even fully born. Dopheld was still gently freeing her feet when her first cries filled the tiny room.

“Oh, you are  _ exactly _ like your father,” Hux groaned at the ceiling as he collapsed back. “Are they both okay?”

“The little one needed some help getting started,” Dopheld reassured him with a shaky smile while he wiped the second baby clean, “but she seems okay now. I—Oh.” 

He blinked in astonishment, suddenly lost for words.

“What is it?” Hux asked, awkwardly pushing himself back up on his elbows. He winced as his body dealt with the rest of the process. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing is wrong, but oh Hux, look at her,” Dopheld sighed. He turned the baby so Hux could see.

A pale red starburst birthmark stretched across her chest, centred over her heart. The shape was so sharply defined it almost looked as if someone had painted or tattooed the pattern onto her skin.

Hux was trembling as he stared at her.

“That’s… That’s where Pryde shot me,” he whispered. “But… What?”

“I think she might be the reason you’re still alive,” Dopheld replied a little louder to be heard over the second baby’s continued wails. “I’ve heard of some unbelievable things the Force can do, when it comes to life.” 

Without really thinking about it Dopheld reached out towards some unsullied towels at the edge of Hux’s impromptu pile.

Two white towels twitched a little, but nothing else happened.

Laughing at himself, Dopheld leant forward to pull them free and set about properly swaddling both babies. He didn’t remember tying off and cutting their cords, but that had been neatly done at some point. Was he forgetting things amidst all the excitement or had Ben done it?

Hux arranged their smallest daughter against this shoulder, mirroring how Dopheld had held her before, then reached out to hold the other’s hand. “I’ve heard rumours of those things too, but she’s here. She’s alive. Ben said he’d died to bring that girl back, but—”

“You were shot in the heart, Hux. She would have been, what, a week or two old? If that? She didn’t _ have  _ a heart to destroy yet. I think the Force did this, I think the Force wanted her  _ and you _ to live.”

“...I don’t know what to say to that.” Hux muttered, and turned his face towards the baby sleeping against his shoulder.

* * *

In the end, the clean up process involved the simple act of ejecting all the gore and ruining fabric into space while Hux took a well earned but careful shower. There was no point trying to clean all that in their little ship, and Hux had asked him to stay by his side as much as possible.

While Dopheld waited to help him dress again, Millicent had conscientiously arranged herself around the babies so that she was between them and the open part of their alcove nest. More than once he saw her move as if to groom them only to stop and lick her own paws instead. 

She really was treating them like her own kittens.

“I’m glad she isn’t jealous,” Hux murmured. Dopheld hadn’t heard him open the refresher door that he was now leaning against, looking tired but happy.

“She loved them long before they arrived, I think,” he replied, and offered Hux the robe in his hands. “I know I did.”

Hux just smiled at him.

* * *

“We should name them,” Hux prompted once all five of them were settled into the warm cosy shadows of their nest. “Now they’re here I don’t think calling them by size is appropriate any more. They have their own personalities already.” 

He sounded more content than Dopheld had ever heard him in all the years they’d known each other. Even when Starkiller had been set to be a success there hadn’t been the warmhearted edge that framed his words now.

“You’re right, do you have any ideas?”

“Some, but I wanted to hear what you thought first.”

“I…” Dopheld sighed through his nose and let his concentration drift for a moment while his fingers stroked the bottom of the baby feet closest to him. Based on the size he suspected they belonged to Med. “I’m not sure I feel comfortable naming… well, not without…”

“Ben’s opinion?” Hux finished the sentence that Dopheld regretted ever starting.

“Yes.”

“Well, let's ask him,” Hux said. “I don’t promise to take it into account, but I’m willing to hear him out. What should we name her?”

Dopheld looked around, waiting for a blue light, or a voice, or a hand on his shoulder. 

None of those things came.

There was an uneasy feeling at the back of his mind but he didn’t want to spoil Hux’s good mood any further by raising the concern.

“I don’t think he’s here,” He said at last.

“More fool him then,” Hux replied so fast that Millicent twitched and mewed in protest at the surprise. “If he has any complaints, he’ll have to live with them, or haunt with them, or whatever he’s doing now. Anyway, I’d like to call our girl with the star Celeste. It seems appropriate.”

“I like that. I’d uh… I like to name the little one Zephyr, after the festival.” Dopheld didn’t really want to tell Hux about those first few terrifying moments of his daughter’s life. Not yet anyway.

“I like that too. So we’re decided?” The last word was half lost in a yawn. 

“I think so, but let’s sleep on it.”

The only response from Hux was a snore.

Dopheld really wanted to curl up with him and sleep too, but the question of what had happened to Ben wouldn’t let him rest.

* * *

Standing in front of the steamy mirror in the refresher Dopheld tried not to panic.

The words written across its surface were barely visible now, the glass already fogging over again where a finger had wiped the condensation away hours earlier. 

I CANT STAY

TAKE CARE OF THEM

In the narrow strip of clear glass around the edge of the mirror Dopheld could see his own reflection.

There was a narrow white stripe in his right eyebrow, and another in his hair running back from his right temple where the skin looked far older than the rest of his face. The stripe had not been there when he’d taken all the towels out of the shower earlier.

As he watched another hair turned white.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning for this chapter-  
> Fear of death  
> One of the babies struggles immediately after their birth  
> Dopheld believes he is taking some drastic action to help
> 
> I refer you to the 'y'all will learn to trust me one day' tag, I promise it'll all be okay in the end

**Author's Note:**

> Just a quick note to say that in this verse Hux is an Omega, Dopheld is a sex-positive asexual Alpha, and Kylo Ren is a mess (and an Alpha, but mostly a mess)


End file.
